The Setaceous Hebrew Character is a moth of the family Noctuidae. It is a common species throughout Europe.The forewings of this species are reddish brown with distinctive patterning towards the base: a black mark resembling the Hebrew letter Nun:
ColeophoraColeophora is a very large genus of moths of the family Coleophoridae with around 1000 described species. The genus is represented on all continents but the majority are found in the Nearctic and Palaearctic regions...
case-bearers C.
Lamium (
deadnettle) is a genus of about 40-50 species of
flowering plantThe flowering plants or angiosperms are the most diverse group of land plants. The flowering plants and the gymnosperms are the only extant groups of seed plants...
s in the family
LamiaceaeLamiaceae or Labiatae, also known as the mint family, is a family of plants. It has been considered closely related to Verbenaceae but several recent phylogenetic studies have shown that numerous genera classified in Verbenaceae belong instead in Lamiaceae, whereas the core genera of Verbenaceae...
, of which family it is the type genus. They are all
herbaceousA herbaceous plant is a plant that has leaves and stems that die down at the end of the growing season to the soil level. They have no persistent woody stem above ground...
plants native to
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
,
AsiaAsia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.6% of the earth's total surface area and with approximately 4 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population.Asia is traditionally defined as part of the...
, and north
AfricaAfrica is the world's second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area. With a billion people in 61 territories, it accounts for about 14.8% of the...
, but several have become very successful
weedA weed in a general sense is a plant that is considered by the user of the term to be a nuisance, and normally applied to unwanted plants in human-made settings such as gardens, lawns or agricultural areas, but also in parks, woods and other natural areas. More specifically, the term is often...
s of
cropAgriculture is the production of food and goods through farming and forestry. Agriculture was the key development that led to the rise of human civilization, with the husbandry of domesticated animals and plants creating food surpluses that enabled the development of more densely populated and...
fields and are now widely
naturalisedIn biology, naturalisation is the process when foreign or cultivated plants or animals have spread into the wild, where they multiply by natural regeneration....
across the temperate world.
The genus includes both
annualAn annual plant is a plant that usually germinates, flowers, and dies in a year or season. True annuals will only live longer than a year if they are prevented from setting seed...
and
perennialA perennial plant or perennial is a plant that lives for more than two years. When used by gardeners or horticulturalists, this term applies specifically to perennial herbaceous plants...
species; they spread by both
seedA seed , referred to as a kernel in some plants, is a small embryonic plant enclosed in a covering called the seed coat, usually with some stored food. It is the product of the ripened ovule of gymnosperm and angiosperm plants which occurs after fertilization and some growth within the mother plant...
s and stems rooting as they grow along the ground.
The common name refers to their
superficial resemblanceBatesian mimicry is a form of mimicry typified by a situation where a harmless species has evolved to imitate the warning signals of a harmful species directed at a common predator...
to the unrelated
stinging nettleNettle is the common name for between 30-45 species of flowering plants of the genus Urtica in the family Urticaceae, with a cosmopolitan though mainly temperate distribution...
s, but unlike those, they do not have stinging hairs and so are harmless or apparently "dead".
Selected species
- Lamium album
Lamium album is a flowering plant in the family Lamiaceae, native throughout Europe and western Asia, growing in a variety of habitats from open grassland to woodland, generally on moist, fertile soils.-Growth:...
(White Deadnettle)
- Lamium amplexicaule
Lamium amplexicaule is a species of Lamium native to Europe, western Asia and northern Africa....
(Henbit Deadnettle)
- Lamium bifidum
- Lamium barbatum
- Lamium corsicum
- Lamium flexuosum
- Lamium garganicum
- Lamium glaberrimum
- Lamium hybridum (Cut-leaf Deadnettle)
- Lamium maculatum
Lamium maculatum is a flowering plant in the family Lamiaceae, native throughout Europe, growing in a variety of habitats from open grassland to woodland, generally on moist, fertile soils.- Origin :Lamium maculatum was depicted in a painting by Carl Linnaeus in the 18th century .Lamium maculatum...
(Spotted White Deadnettle, Purple Dragon)
- Lamium moluccellifolium (Northern Deadnettle)
- Lamium moschatum
- Lamium orvala
- Lamium purpureum (Red Deadnettle)
Several closely related genera were formerly included in
Lamium by some botanists, including
Lamiastrum galeobdolon (Yellow Archangel),
Galeopsis (hemp-nettles) and
LeonurusLeonurus is a genus of flowering plants in the family Lamiaceae.Leonurus japonicus is one of the 50 fundamental herbs used in traditional Chinese medicine...
(motherworts).
Lamium species are used as food plants by the
larvaA larva is a young form of animal with indirect development, going through or undergoing metamorphosis ....
e of some
LepidopteraLepidoptera is an order of insects that includes moths and butterflies. It is one of the most speciose orders in the class Insecta, encompassing moths and the three superfamilies of butterflies, skipper butterflies, and moth-butterflies...
species including
Angle ShadesThe Angle Shades is a moth of the family Noctuidae. It is a common and familiar European species and is often strongly migratory....
,
Setaceous Hebrew CharacterThe Setaceous Hebrew Character is a moth of the family Noctuidae. It is a common species throughout Europe.The forewings of this species are reddish brown with distinctive patterning towards the base: a black mark resembling the Hebrew letter Nun:
ColeophoraColeophora is a very large genus of moths of the family Coleophoridae with around 1000 described species. The genus is represented on all continents but the majority are found in the Nearctic and Palaearctic regions...
case-bearers C. ballotella, C. lineolea and C. ochripennella.
Cultivation
Lamiums are frost hardy and grow well in most soils. Flower colour determines planting season and light requirement: white- and purple-coloured flowered species are planted in spring and prefer full sun. The yellow-flowered ones are planted in fall (autumn) and prefer shade. They often have invasive'Invasive species' is a phrase with several definitions. The first definition expresses the phrase in terms of non-indigenous species that adversely affect the habitats they invade economically, environmentally or ecologically...
habits and need plenty of room. Propagate from seed or by division in early spring.