Nepeta tenuifolia Benth.

Variety japonica (Maximowicz) Kitagawa is native to Japan.

A traditional Chinese herb used for diaphoresis and also as the source of an essential oil.

Herbs annual. Stems 30-100 cm tall, much branched, sparsely gray pubescent. Leaves 3-fid, unequal; petiole 2-10 mm; leaf blade 1-3.5 × 1.5-2.5 cm, adaxially dark puberulent, abaxially gray-green, pubescent especially on veins and margin, glandular, base cuneate-decurrent into petiole, lobes lanceolate, 1.5-4 mm wide, with middle lobe largest, margin entire, apex acute. Spikes terminal, 2-13 cm, interrupted, of numerous verticillasters; bracts leaflike, reduced upward, as long as flowers; bracteoles linear, minute. Calyx tubular-campanulate, ca. 3 × 1.2 mm, gray pilose, 15-veined; teeth triangular-lanceolate to lanceolate, ca. 0.7 mm, apex acuminate, posterior teeth longer. Corolla violet, ca. 4.5 mm, pilose. Nutlets brown, triquetrous, oblong, ca. 1.5 × 0.7 mm, dotted. Fl. Jul-Sep, fr. Aug-Oct.

Gansu, Guizhou, Hebei, Heilongjiang, Henan, Liaoning, Qinghai, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Sichuan and cultivated in Fujian, Jiangsu, Yunnan, Zhejiang [Korea]

Sloping forest margins, valleys; 500-2700 m.

Elsholtzia integrifolia Bentham; Nepeta vaniotiana H. Léveillé.