Potentilla
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| Potentilla | ||||||||||||||
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| Missing image Potentilla_sterilis.JPG Potentilla sterilis leaves | ||||||||||||||
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Potentilla is a genus of about 500 species of annual, biennial and perennial herbs in the rose family Rosaceae, native to most of the Northern Hemisphere. Common names include cinquefoil, tormentil, barren strawberry and silverweed.
Many of the species have leaves divided into five leaflets arranged palmately (like the fingers of a hand), whence the name cinquefoil (French, cinque feuilles, "five leaves"), though some species (e.g. P. sterilis) have just three leaflets, and others (e.g. P. anserina) up to 15 or more leaflets arranged pinnately. The leaves of some cinquefoils are eaten by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species including Emperor Moth.
They are closely related to the avens in the genera Geum and Dryas, and also to the strawberries in the genus Fragaria, differing from the strawberries in having dry, inedible fruit (hence the name "barren strawberry" for some species).
Some species are grown as garden plants.
The shrubby plant previously included in this genus as Potentilla fruticosa, has recently been shown from genetic evidence not to belong to Potentilla at all, and is now treated in the genus Dasiphora as Dasiphora fruticosa. Another species previously treated as Potentilla arguta is similarly now separated into the genus Drymocallis as Drymocallis arguta.