In short
- The main attraction is the foliage: green with a silvery streak along the midrib, silvered over almost the whole blade in garden cultivars.
- A shade plant — partial and full shade; it also copes in dry shade under trees and shrubs, where grass will not grow.
- It spreads by creeping stems that root at the nodes and by underground runners; at a spacing of 35–45 cm the carpet closes up in the second season.
- It flowers from May to September, most abundantly in May and June; the long-tubed flowers are visited mainly by bumblebees.
- Cutting the carpet back to about 5 cm after flowering rejuvenates it — without this the stems flop and the middle of the clump goes bare.
Botanical data
- Family
- Lamiaceae (Lamiaceae)
- Height
- 0.15–0.6 m
- Width
- 0.4–1 m
- Habit
- Creeping
- Growth rate
- Fast
- Position
- Partial shade, Shade
- Soil
- Humus-rich, Loamy
- pH reaction
- pH 6–7.5
- Moisture
- Moderate, Moist
- Bloom
- May–September
- Hardiness
- USDA 4a–8a
- Propagation
- By division, From cuttings, By runners
Characteristics
A perennial with creeping or ascending stems, square in cross-section like those of all mints and rooting at the nodes — so that a single plant spreads sideways and forms a dense carpet 0.4–1 m wide. Besides the creeping stems it produces a branched rhizome and underground runners, by which it also propagates vegetatively. In cultivation the clump is usually 15–25 cm tall; the erect or ascending flowering stems of typical forms and wild plants can be markedly taller, reaching 60 cm. The leaves are opposite, stalked, ovate to triangular-heart-shaped, scalloped-toothed, somewhat wrinkled and softly hairy. Their distinguishing feature is the pale, silvery-white streak running along the midrib — it is the source of the specific epithet maculatum, meaning 'spotted'. In wild plants the streak is narrow; garden cultivars have been selected so that the silver covers almost the whole blade, leaving the green as a narrow border. The flowers are typically two-lipped: the corolla tube is long and curved, the upper lip hooded and hairy, the lower one three-lobed, with a darker pattern that guides the insect to the nectar; they are gathered into false whorls in the axils of the upper leaves. The colour ranges from pink and purplish-pink to pure white in cultivars such as White Nancy. Flowering lasts from May to September, but is most abundant in May and June — later the flowers appear only in flushes, especially after the carpet is cut back. The plant behaves as semi-evergreen: in mild winters the basal leaves last until spring, in harsher ones the carpet dies back to the ground and regrows from buds at the base of the stems. It differs from common stinging nettle, to which it is likened because of its leaf shape, in its lack of stinging hairs, its square stem and its two-lipped flower — the two plants belong to entirely different families.
Popular cultivars
- ‘White Nancy’
- Leaf almost entirely silvery, with a narrow green border, flowers pure white. The most commonly planted white cultivar; compact and low, it brightens deep shade most effectively.
- ‘Beacon Silver’
- A classic cultivar with a strongly silvered leaf with a green edge and pinkish-lilac flowers. In wet, muggy summers it can be more prone than others to leaf spots.
- ‘Purple Dragon’
- A cultivar with markedly larger and darker, purple-violet flowers; leaf silver with a green border. Chosen when the flowering, as well as the foliage, is meant to show.
- ‘Pink Pewter’
- Silver leaf and delicate, pale pink flowers. It grows densely and evenly, which makes it work well as an edging for a shady border.
- ‘Anne Greenaway’
- Tricoloured leaf: a green blade with a silver streak and a yellow-green border, lilac-pink flowers. The most decorative in foliage, but it only colours up well in bright partial shade.
- ‘Golden Anniversary’
- Green leaf centre, a silver streak and a golden-yellow edge, pink flowers. It grows more slowly than the silver cultivars and needs shelter from harsh sun, which scorches the golden border.
Growing and care
Watering
On mulched soil in shade it usually manages on its own. It needs watering in the first season after planting and in prolonged drought — then the leaves wilt and powdery mildew appears. It does not tolerate standing water: in hollows with waterlogging the carpet rots from the inside.
Fertilizing
A thin layer of compost or composted leaves spread around the clump. Excess nitrogen makes the stems elongate and flop, so mineral fertilisers are unnecessary.
Planting
Mix the top layer with compost and, after planting, mulch with bark or leaves. In dry shade under trees, dig larger holes than usual and water through the first season, until the plants push their roots through the dense mesh of tree roots.
Pruning
After flowering, cut the whole carpet back with shears or a mower on a high setting, to about 5 cm. Within 2–3 weeks the plant regrows a dense, freshly coloured rosette of leaves and often flowers again. In early spring remove leaves damaged by winter, and during the season cut off rooted stems straying beyond their allotted place.
Companion plants
Good companions
Klasyczne zestawienie cienistej rabaty: srebrny kobierzec jasnoty rozjaśnia podstawę dużej, niebieskozielonej kępy funkii i zakrywa ziemię wtedy, gdy funkia jeszcze nie wzeszła albo już zamarła. Obie potrzebują próchnicznej, umiarkowanie wilgotnej gleby w półcieniu.
Pionowy pióropusz paproci i płaski kobierzec jasnoty dzielą to samo siedlisko runa leśnego i nie konkurują o światło na tym samym poziomie — jasnota zajmuje ziemię pod liśćmi paproci.
Bergenia ma duże, skórzaste liście i mocną kępę, której jasnota nie jest w stanie zagłuszyć; kontrast grubej, ciemnej blaszki ze srebrną drobną jasnotą działa przez cały sezon, także zimą.
Bad companions
Dwie płożące byliny okrywowe o identycznych wymaganiach i tym samym sposobie rozrostu — ukorzenianiu pędów. Zamiast czystego kobierca powstaje niestabilna mozaika, w której jedna roślina wypiera drugą.
Paproć strusia rozrasta się podziemnymi rozłogami i tworzy zwartą kolonię, która z czasem przerasta i wypiera niższy kobierzec jasnoty.
The evidence level indicates whether the relationship is backed by research, observation, or gardening tradition.
Diseases and pests
A white, powdery coating on leaves, shoots and buds. The leaves turn yellow, become deformed and drop prematurely. The coating develops on both sides of the leaf blade, is often clearly visible from above, and can easily be rubbed off with a finger — it is the superficial mycelium of an ectoparasite that draws nutrients from the epidermal cells by means of feeding structures (haustoria). At first single, round, white spots appear, which in time merge and cover the entire leaf surface and the young growth. Young leaves and the current season's shoots are the most susceptible; heavy infection causes them to pucker, stiffen and stop growing, and on buds it leads to deformation or death of the flowers. On the fruit of some species (gooseberry, apple, cucurbits) the coating leaves russeting or a corky skin. Towards the end of the season, small, dark fruiting bodies (chasmothecia, formerly called cleistothecia) — the pathogen's overwintering structures — appear within the coating. The disease affects many plants, including roses, oak, privet, lilac, cucurbits, cereals, grapevine, apple, gooseberry, phlox and coneflowers, with each of these hosts being infected by a specialised species of fungus.
Grey mouldA grey-brown, fluffy coating of mycelium on flowers, fruit, leaves and shoots, preceded by watery, rotting spots. It attacks weakened and damaged tissue and develops rapidly in humidity and cool conditions and where air circulation is poor. Common on strawberries, begonias, peonies and roses. The coating is characteristically 'mousy' — fluffy and ashy grey, and when the infected tissue is knocked a visible cloud of spores (conidia) puffs up, which is a diagnostic feature of this disease. Infection usually starts in the weakest tissues: fading petals, wounds, hail marks or pest feeding damage, as well as pollen residue settled on the petals. Small, brown, watery spots appear on the flowers and quickly engulf the whole bloom ('flower blight'); from the infected flower the fungus often grows down into the shoot, causing it to constrict and die back. On soft fruit (strawberry, raspberry, grapes, tomato) a watery, browning rot develops, covered with a thick layer of grey, fluffy felt — the berry softens and 'dissolves'. On seedlings and cuttings Botrytis causes basal stem rot and the sudden collapse of plants. In older, dying mycelium and on plant debris hard, black, irregular lumps form — sclerotia (resting bodies), by which the pathogen overwinters in the soil and in plant debris. The disease also shows up after harvest, as a rapidly advancing storage rot of fruit and vegetables.
Slugs and snailsSlugs and shelled snails that feed at night and after rain. Symptoms: irregular holes in the leaves and young seedlings eaten off completely, silvery slime trails on leaves and soil. The greatest damage occurs in damp, shaded spots — particularly on lettuce, strawberries and hostas. The most damaging in gardens are the slugs (which lack an external shell): the Spanish slug (Arion vulgaris, formerly described as A. lusitanicus) and the grey field slug (Deroceras reticulatum). The leopard slug (Limax maximus) can be morphologically similar to them, but it feeds mainly on decaying organic matter and fungi and may even prey on other slugs, so it is of little importance as a pest of living plants. Shelled forms — grove snails (Cepaea) or the protected Roman snail (Helix pomatia) — usually cause less damage. The body is soft, elongated and permanently covered in slime; on the head there are two pairs of retractable tentacles — the longer upper pair bears the eyes, the shorter lower pair serves a tactile and olfactory function. Slugs and snails are hermaphrodites: they lay spherical, transparent or pearly eggs in clusters, hidden in damp soil, under stones and in leaf litter. A single Spanish slug can lay several hundred eggs; both eggs and young slugs overwinter, and feeding lasts from spring to late autumn, intensifying on warm, damp nights. The damage has smooth edges and often appears in the middle of the leaf blade, not only from the margin; seedlings and transplants are sometimes eaten down to bare soil, and on strawberries and ripening vegetables the slugs gnaw hollows into the fruit. The decisive diagnostic sign is the dried, silvery glistening slime trail — no insect leaves one.
Toxicity
| For whom | Level | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Humans | None | The plant is not poisonous, but it is not a herbal raw material either — herbalism uses the flower of white deadnettle (Lamium album), not the spotted one. |
| Dogs | None | — |
| Cats | None | — |
History and origin
Linnaeus first described this taxon in his work 'Species Plantarum' of 1753 as a variety of white deadnettle — Lamium album var. maculatum — and raised it to the rank of a distinct species in the second edition of that work, in 1763; hence the full citation of the name reads Lamium maculatum (L.) L. The genus name Lamium is linked to the Greek laimos, meaning throat, referring to the shape of the long corolla tube. In Poland spotted deadnettle is a native plant: it grows in the understorey of fertile deciduous woodland, in riparian forests and streamside thickets, and also along roadsides and in ruderal places, fairly commonly throughout the country — both in the lowlands and in the lower mountain zones. It entered gardens not as a flowering plant but as a foliage one — it was only the selection work of the second half of the 20th century, which produced cultivars with silver spread over the whole blade (Beacon Silver, White Nancy), that made it one of the staple ground-cover perennials for shade. Colloquial names in many languages repeat the same misunderstanding: the German Taubnessel and the English deadnettle mean literally 'deaf' and 'dead nettle', that is, one that does not sting. In North America, where the species arrived from cultivation, it has escaped and in some north-eastern states is regarded as an invasive plant; in Poland, within its natural range, it poses no such problem.
Uses
The basic use is as ground cover for difficult places: under trees and shrubs, against north-facing walls, along shady paths and on shaded banks, where grass will not grow and many perennials fail. It is planted at a spacing of 35–45 cm, at five to eight plants per square metre — at this density the carpet closes up in the second season. The silver of the leaves brightens shade more effectively than the flowers do, and works throughout the season, so deadnettle makes a gracious backdrop for plants with large or dark foliage: hostas, ferns, bergenias, coral bells with purple leaves. It also works well as an edging for a shady border and as a trailing plant spilling from pots and boxes set in shade — including on a north-facing balcony — especially in the white-flowered cultivars. In dry shade under shallow-rooted trees it copes better than most perennials, but it establishes more slowly — in the first year it needs watering and mulching, later it usually looks after itself. It spreads quickly and encroaches on its neighbours, so it is not planted next to low, slow-growing perennials or in collector's borders; keeping it in check is simple, though, because it is enough to pull up the rooted stems at the edge of the carpet, and the pulled fragment is immediately ready to plant elsewhere. It is not suited to positions in full sun or to dry, overheated beds — there the leaves wilt, lose their colouring and quickly become covered with powdery mildew.
Trivia
- The specific epithet maculatum means 'spotted' and refers to the pale streak along the leaf midrib. It is present in wild plants too — breeders have merely widened it to cover the whole blade.
- The herbal raw material is white deadnettle (Lamium album), not the spotted one: it is the flowers of white deadnettle that feature in herbalism as a demulcent for the mucous membranes. Spotted deadnettle is harmless, but in these uses it does not replace the white one.
- The two-lipped flower with its long, curved tube is adapted to bumblebees: the insect lands on the lower lip and reaches for nectar deep in the tube, while pollen is dusted onto its back from the hooded upper lip. The honeybee, with its shorter tongue, makes poorer use of deadnettle — hence the resource is rated as moderate despite the long flowering.
- Despite leaves deceptively similar to those of stinging nettle, deadnettle is not related to it — it belongs to the mint family (Lamiaceae), like mint and sage, while nettle belongs to the nettle family (Urticaceae). Touch and a cross-section of the stem, which in deadnettle is distinctly square, settle the matter.
Frequently asked questions
Is spotted deadnettle expansive and will it smother its neighbours?
It spreads quickly, but in a way that is easy to control. It spreads mainly by creeping stems that root at the nodes on the soil surface, so an unwanted fragment can usually just be pulled up together with the rooted stem; in older clumps it is worth checking that no rhizome or underground runner is left in the ground, because the plant regrows from these. It only becomes a problem next to low, slow-growing perennials and in collector's borders; as ground cover under shrubs and trees it is safe. The edge of the carpet is worth reviewing twice a season.
The carpet looks untidy after flowering and goes bare in the middle — what should I do?
This is the normal reaction of deadnettle after the main flowering and the standard moment to cut it back. The whole carpet is cut with shears or a mower on a high setting, to about 5 cm. Within 2–3 weeks the plant regrows a dense, freshly coloured rosette of leaves, which will last until winter, and often flowers again. Neglecting this operation is the commonest cause of sprawling clumps that are bare in the centre.
Will deadnettle cope in dry shade under trees?
Yes, it is one of the few perennials that tolerate this, but it needs help getting started. Competition from tree roots means the plants establish more slowly, so in the first season they need regular watering and a mulch of bark or leaves. Once rooted they look after themselves, though in a very dry summer the leaves may wilt and powdery mildew appears. It should not be mistaken for a plant tolerant of drought in full sun — there it will not cope.
How does spotted deadnettle differ from the white and purple ones?
Spotted deadnettle (Lamium maculatum) is a ground-cover perennial with leaves bearing a pale streak along the midrib and pink or white flowers, grown in gardens. White deadnettle (Lamium album) has uniformly green leaves and pure white flowers; it is the herbal plant and a common species of roadsides. Purple deadnettle (Lamium purpureum) is an annual, low, with purple upper leaves — a common weed of crops and gardens, not planted deliberately.
Is spotted deadnettle poisonous to children, dogs and cats?
It is not classed among poisonous plants and it has no stinging hairs, even though its leaves resemble those of nettle. This does not mean, however, that it is a herbal raw material — herbalism uses the flower of white deadnettle (Lamium album), not the spotted one, so garden deadnettle is not gathered for teas and infusions.
Sources
- Plants of the World Online (POWO) — Lamium maculatumDatabase (GBIF, POWO…)
- RHS — Lamium maculatumInstitution / botanical garden
- Missouri Botanical Garden — Plant Finder: Lamium maculatumInstitution / botanical garden
- Atlas roślin Polski — jasnota plamista (Lamium maculatum)Database (GBIF, POWO…)
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