Potentilla thurberi is found along higher elevation roadsides, moist creekbeds, and meadows. The deep red flowers have a "velvety" appearance. The relatively large and heavily veined serrate leaves are palmately divided. The pale anthers stand out against the darker central portion of the petals.

Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Perennial from short woody taproot, stems erect 30-60 cm tall pubescent to sparsely villous.

Leaves: Alternate, with basal leaves long petiolate, palmately 5-7 foliolate, the leaflets 3-5 cm long, leaflets obovate to oblong, glabrate to sparsely silky hairy beneath, margins serrate, with 1-2 cm long broadly ovate stipules, cauline lives sessile above.

Flowers: Open branched cyme, with few to several flowers, 1.5 cm wide, 5 acuminate sepals, 5 red sepals, these orbicular, emarginate and exceeding the sepals, with 20-30 stamens, and terminal style longer than achene.

Fruits: Achene about 1 mm long.

Ecology: Found in moist soils along streams or in damp meadows from 5,000-9,000 ft (1524-2743 m); flowers July-September.

Notes: Can be more leggy than other Potentilla, but you-ll really key in on the rose-red color of the petals which are genuinely one of the more beautiful summer flowers.

Ethnobotany: Unknown

Etymology: Potentilla comes from Latin diminutive of potens, meaning powerful, while thurberi is named for Dr. George Thurber (1821-1890) a botanist on the Mexican Boundary Survey of 1850-1854.

Synonyms: None

Editor: SBuckley, 2010