Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center


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Aquatic and Wetland Vascular Plants of the Northern Great Plains

26. Rosaceae, the Rose Family

2. Potentilla L. -- Cinquefoil

1. Potentilla anserina L. -- Silverweed

Low, extensively stoloniferous perennial from a stout rootstock; leaves basal except for a few clustered on the stolons, pinnately compound with numerous leaflets, small leaflets often alternating with larger ones; blade oblanceolate in outline; 0.5-3(5) dm long, including the petiole which may be 1/2 the total leaf length, 2-8 cm wide, green and glabrous to grayish-green and sericeous above, densely white-tomentose beneath; leaflets elliptic to oblong or obovate, 1.5-5 cm long, 0.5-1.8 cm wide, greatly reduced downward, deeply serrate, the teeth sharply ascending; stipules prominent as brownish membranous wings on the basal portion of the petiole. Flowers yellow, rather showy, solitary from the leafy nodes of the stolons, on peduncles 4-15(25) cm long; sepals ovate, acuminate, white-sericeous on the outside; petals elliptic to obovate or nearly rotund, 5-10 mm long; stamens 20-25; pistils numerous, styles attached laterally on the ovary. Mature achenes golden brown, obliquely ovoid, usually corky with ridges or furrows. Jun--Aug. Wet meadows, ditches, shores, stream banks and mud flats; common and often weedy in ND, e MT and e SD, otherwise scattered in w SD, e WY and w NE; (Circumboreal, in N.Amer. s to NY, IN, IA, NE, NM and CA).

Potentilla anserina.

Map key

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