(A) American Brooklime (Veronica americana), the prettiest of the Speedwells or Veronicas, is a very frail plant.
The stem is stout, smooth, hollow, and quite weak; the lower part spreads over the ground and frequently takes root at the angles of the lower leaves. At intervals, branches rise to heights of 6 to 15 inches, bearing from the axils of the upper leaves small four-parted blue flowers in loose racemes. The light-blue petals have purple stripes and a white spot at the base.
Brooklime has a long season of bloom, being found in flower from May until September. It is common in moist ditches and along brooks or in swamps, from Newfoundland to Alaska and south to Va. and Mo.
(B) Common Speedwell (Veronica officinalis) is a popular little plant. The prostrate wooly stem is erect at the end and terminates in a raceme of pale-lavender, four-petalled flowers, the lower petal of which is conspicuously smaller than the other three, a common trait of this genus. Speedwell is quite common through the United States and southern Canada.
(A) Purple Gerardia (Gerardia purpurea) is a pretty little species that decorates low, moist, sandy fields and meadows with its beautiful purple-pink blossoms. The slender stem is quite branchy and averages about a foot in height, though it occasionally attains heights of 2 feet. From three to eight flowers, opening one at a time, grow along the ends of each branch. The corolla is broad and about 1 in. long, bright purplish pink, the mouth of the funnel spreading into five rounded lobes, spotted or downy within.
All the Gerardias and Foxgloves are quite parasitic, attaching their roots to those of other plants and getting part of their sustenance from them. This species is found chiefly along the coasts of the Atlantic, the Great Lakes, and the Gulf of Mexico. It blooms from August to October.
(B) Smooth False Foxglove (Gerardia virginica) has a smooth, branching stem from 2 to 6 feet high. The large, lemon-yellow flowers measure nearly 2 inches long by an inch broad. The plant grows from Me. to Minn. and southward and blooms during August and Sept.
