Potentilla gracilis / slender cinquefoil

Adjectives: drought tolerant, exposed, grasslands/meadows, native, roadsides, wet meadows

Also known as: graceful cinquefoil, fanleaf cinquefoil, alpine cinquefoil

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The flowers of slender cinquefoil grow in sparse, flat-topped clusters (cymes) that branch out from the upper stem. Like other members of the rosaceae, the flowers have a ring of many yellow stamens. In this case, the anthers themselves are heart-shaped; the styles are yellow-greenish. The five petals have flat tips and touch each other or slightly overlap. The sepals are green, pointed, and hairy.

Slender cinquefoil leaves are grayish, oval and divided into 5 to 9 sharply toothed leaflets. The individual leaflets are lance shaped, but with the sharp end toward the base of the leaf rather than away. The leaves may be a bit hairy, especially on the lower side.

Slender cinquefoil is a native wildflower that is considered a facultative wetland plant. Other than wetlands, however, it is common in meadows and grasslands, on roadsides, and in subalpine meadows. Its growth is usually erect rather than reclining (recumbent). It is a perennial, growing from a short, thick rhizome or a branched woody caudex.

For some reason, slender cinquefoil was chosen for a study of western plant responses to freezing nights and warm days. As the authors noted, “Leaves often freeze to a brittle state at night, are exposed to high radiation (light) while still frosty, dehydrate to wilting during the following light period, and then repeat the cycle the following day.” While this is a common scenario (in the view of those of us who live in the Valley), it is a combination that wreaks havoc on many crop and cold sensitive species which simply don’t recover from all that. In this case, however, while there is some lingering effect of the cold during the day, recovery is complete.