About Urtica urens L.
Urtica urens L. is an annual, monoecious plant, meaning it bears both male and female flowers on the same individual, and it is typically much shorter than the related perennial, dioecious stinging nettle Urtica dioica. It can be told apart from U. dioica by its more rounded leaves, which have coarser, deeper teeth, and whose terminal tooth is similar in length to the teeth next to it. Its lower leaves are shorter than their own longer petioles, and only bear stinging hairs. The native range of Urtica urens covers most of Europe excluding the British Isles, northern Asia, and northern and northwest Africa. In the British Isles, it is classified as an archaeophyte, an ancient introduced species. It has been introduced to every continent worldwide except Antarctica.
