Comarum palustre

Marsh cinquefoil, Marsh Cinquefoil

Family: Rosaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Marsh cinquefoil is a native perennial found in northern coastal California, northern California high country, northern Sierra Nevada, Sacramento Valley, and Warner Mountains in bogs and marshes at elevations up to 2,400 meters. Flowering from May to August, this plant produces dark red flowers small and delicate, approximately 2 to 6 millimeters long. Growing with erect to ascending stems 20 to 50 centimeters tall that are creeping and often floating or rooting at nodes, it forms an openly matted habit. Its compound leaves have 4 to 6 total leaflets, each 15 to 70 millimeters long, oblanceolate-elliptic with toothed edges, primarily glabrous to sparsely hairy. The fruit develops as tiny, glossy brown achenes that sometimes remain attached to a spongy receptacle.

Habitat: Bogs, marshes

Bloom period: May-Aug

Elevation: < 2400 m

Bioregions: NCo, CaRH, n SNH, ScV, Wrn

California counties: Humboldt, Modoc, Sierra, Alpine, Del Norte, Mendocino, Nevada, Shasta, El Dorado, Plumas, Lassen, Sacramento

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.