PNW Native
Ranges across northern Hemisphere (A)
Shrubby cinquefoil is a shrub growing in large mats up to 2 ft tall. It has buttercup-like yellow flowers with five petals, each petal about 0.5 in long, and with 10 sepals. Leaves are compound with 3, 5, or 7, hairy lance-shaped leaflets. Fruits are hairy seedpods. (DM)
Shrubby cinquefoil is not valued as a forage species but is so widespread as a ground cover with leaves persisting into winter that ungulates turn to the plant as important forage. Mammals and small birds consume the seeds. Shrubby cinquefoil is moderate cover for mule deer and highly-valued hiding cover and nesting grounds for game birds, songbirds, and small mammals. (A)
Shrubby cinquefoil occurs with rough fescue in many northern and western grasslands. These two plant species appear to be mutualistic and exist in symbiosis. (A)
Shrubby cinquefoil grows in large ground-covering mat-like thickets in rocky alpine and subalpine sites with lots of sun exposure. They make extraordinary springtime wildflower displays in the high country. (DM)
Shrubby cinquefoil leaves were dried to make tea by Native Americans. Dried leaves were also part of a poison used to coat arrows and powdered leaves were thought to prevent the body from short exposures to severe heat. (A) According to Erna Gunther, only the Chehalis tribe knew of cinquefoil, and they did not have a name for the plant in their language. However, it is said amongst the Chehalis that if a woman wished to give birth to a girl she should drink tea from yellow cinquefoil flowers, and if she wished to give birth to a boy to drink tea from the white flowers. (EG) The Tahltan tribe amongst other northern coastal peoples drink tea made from shrubby cinquefoil. (NT)
Shrubby cinquefoil is a valuable landscape ornamental due to its continuous summer bloom and is seldom browsed by deer. Cinquefoil also has utility in soil stabilization and erosion control and may be used in restoration plantings. (A)
[1] Anderson, Michelle D. 2001. Dasiphora fruticosa subsp. floribunda. In: Fire Effects Information System,. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fire Sciences Laboratory (Producer). Available: https://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/plants/shrub/dasfruf/all.html.
