Stinging Nettle surrounded Erika and me on 19 May 2021 at the Woodard Bay Nature Reserve. This plant is another introduced species. It originally grew in Europe, Asia, and western North Africa. Nettle now grows in across much of the western hemisphere and Australia.
Wikipedia mentions that nettle is especially common in the Pacific Northwest. Most people know that Stinging Nettle hurts when you come in contact with it. The plant impales you with spicules and releases a number of chemical irritants. Soaking and boiling nettle removes the irritating chemicals in the plant, which has a long list of human uses. Despite being the Red Admiral butterfly caterpillar’s primary host, nettle is seldom welcome in gardens and can be difficult to control.
The Wikipedia article you cite in internally inconsistent as it also mentions (under subspecies) that there are two subspecies native to North America. Minnesota Wildflowers mentions that the nominal subspecies (from the Palarctic) has been introduced to both the east and west coasts of North America. I don't know enough to say whether the Stinging Nettles of your region are native or introduced subspecies.
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