Common Name:
OLD-FIELD CINQUEFOIL, COMMON CINQUEFOIL
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Coefficient of Conservatism:
2
Coefficient of Wetness:
3
Wetness Index:
FACU
Physiognomy:
Nt P-Forb
G. Vaclavek
Usually in dry open sandy forests, with oak, hickory, aspen, sassafras, and/or jack pine; fields, roadsides, and sandy barren ground; also in moist thickets and deciduous forests, and on rocky ledges.
This is our commonest species with solitary flowers and palmately compound leaves but is very similar to the much less common P. canadensis L. Typically in P. simplex the stem is initially ± erect, ca. 1 mm thick or thicker. The stem as it elongates becomes ± arching and essentially stoloniferous. Potentilla canadensis is a more delicate plant, the stems less than 1 mm thick (often ca. 0.5 mm) and ± prostrate from the beginning. The cauline (stolon) leaves are less than half grown at flowering time in P. canadensis, as it flowers early, sometimes before the stem elongates.