Plant

Sulfur or Rough-Fruited Cinquefoil,  Potentilla recta
Rosaceae or Rose Family

Erect plant, to 2 ft tall. Leaves with 5 to 7 leaflets arranged like fingers (palmate). Leaflets strongly toothed and strongly veined. Flowers pale yellow, with 5 heart-shaped petals. Blooms in summer.

Alien plant of dry fields and roadsides, considered a noxious weed in some states. Occaional in Wildwood, mostly in the South Meadow area. 

The strongly toothed palmate leaves and 5-petaled yellow flowers mark this as a cinquefoil. The native common cinquefoil (P. simplex) and Canada cinquefoil (P. canadensis) are weak, sprawling plants with bright yellow flowers. Rough or Norwegian cinquefoil (P. norvegica) has only three leaflets.

Flower and Leaf
Flower

 

Leaves

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