Shrubby Cinquefoil, Yellow Rose

Shrubby cinquefoil has recently been reclassified as Dasiphora floribunda. In the west it has also been commonly known as Potentilla fruticosa. Other recnt scientific names include Dasiphora fruticosa, Pentaphylloides floribunda, Pentaphylloides fruticosa, and Potentilla floribunda (information gleaned from the USDA Plants Database website) .

Shrubby cinquefoil is a much-branched, deciduous shrub with a spreading to erect habit. It may attain a height of 10 to 160 cm. The leaves are numerous, alternate and pinnately compound, generally having 5 narrow elliptical, entire leaflets. Individual leaflets are 1 to 2 cm in length, and covered with grayish, silky-pilose hairs. The bark is reddish brown, and frequently shreds.

The flowers are either single in the leaf axils or in loose terminal cymes of 3 to 9 flowers. Individual flowers are bright yellow, showy and about 2.5 cm across. The hypanthium is saucer-shaped and surrounde by sepal-like bracts. The petals are longer than the sepal-like bracts.A large central cluster of numerous pistils and approximately 25 to 30 stamens are found mid-flower. The fruits are numerous single-seeded achenes covered with silky hairs.

Shrubby Cinquefoil is a beautiful shrub in the wilds, and has been cultivated extensively. It should be readily found at many western nurseries.

Shrubby cinquefoil is found in a variety of habitats. It is a bog and muskeg plant in the tundra, and is found in the subalpine zone in northern British Columbia. To the south, it is a mat-forming alpine plant in the Cascades, and inhabits meadows in the sagebrush desert east of the Cascades. It is primarily subalpine in the Olympic Mts.

Shrubby cinquefoil is a widespread montane species, found from Alaska southward through the Cascade and Olympic Mountains to the Sierra Nevada, and eastward on the plains to subalpine slopes to Colorado, New Mexico, further northeast to Iowa, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Labrador.