Plantain Ribgrass (Plantago Major, L.)

The habitat of this plant is pastures, waste places. The plant has the rosette habit. The rootstock is stout, blunt. The plant is smooth or hairy. The leaves are radical, stalked, oblong, ovate, toothed, 3-7 ribbed, the stalks broad, short, channelled, long, ascending. The scape is as long as the leaves, short, not furrowed. The flowers are in a slender, long spike, longer than the scape, which is round, with ovate bracts, keeled, as long as the calyx. The sepals are free, and have a blunt, well-marked dorsal rib, and have membranous borders. The corolla-tube is smooth. The anthers are purple, on short stalks. The capsule is 2-celled, with 8-16 seeds. The seeds are flat in front, black, rough, mucilaginous externally. The plant is 2-9 in. high, or more, flowering from May to September, and is a herbaceous perennial.