Vern.: ‘Gar’.

I.C. Hedge

Perennial herb. Stems sturdy, 100-200 cm, fistulose, purplish or brown, glabrous or with a prominent covering of dendroid-stellate hairs. Leaves broadly ovate, 10-15 (-20) x 10-15 (-20) cm, deeply cordate, crenate, rugose, discolorous, above greenish with a sparse indumentum of short simple hairs, below white canescent-tomentose with dendroid-stellate hairs; petiole 10-15 cm on basal leaves, shorter on scattered cauline leaves. Verticillasters in axils of upper leaves, 3-5, distant, 10-20-flowered, 3-4 cm in diameter. Bracts subulate, stiffly pungent, somewhat spreading from calyces and equalling or shorter than them. Calyx 14-16 mm, densely covered with ± adpressed dendroid-stellate hairs and at apex with some long simple hairs; teeth markedly unequal ± 4 mm and 6 mm, rigid, spiny. Corolla rose or pink, c. 2.5 cm; upper lip falcate, white bearded on inner margins and densely covered with dendroid-stellate hairs usually with one very long ray and several much smaller ones. Mature outlets not seen.

Fl. Per.: July-September.

Type: "in valle Cachemiriana" Falconer (K), Jacquemont (K).

Distribution: E. Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kashmir to Nepal.

The large ovate deeply cordate leaves, the tall habit and the simple hairs on the upper leaf surface are characteristic. There is considerable variation in the stem indumentum from glabrous to quite densely hairy. In Kashmir usually growing in dry rocky areas.