Creeping cinquefoil

How to recognise it

Growth habit

Perennial with creeping, above-ground runners a metre or more long, which root at the nodes. Leaves and flowers reach 5–20 cm.

Leaf

Palmately compound, with 5, sometimes 7 oval, toothed leaflets of 1–4 cm on long stalks; green and slightly hairy.

Flower

Single, butter-yellow, 1.5–2.5 cm across, with five slightly notched petals, on long stalks from the nodes of the runners, from June to September.

Fruit/Seed

A small ball of tiny nutlets inside the persistent sepals.

Roots

A short, slightly thickened rootstock, plus new roots at every node of the runners.

Confusion with

Creeping buttercup has three-lobed leaves and glossy yellow flowers. Tormentil usually has four petals and almost stalkless, three-part leaves. Trailing tormentil has four or five petals and leaves with three to five leaflets, and grows on more acid soil. Silverweed has pinnate, silvery-haired leaves. Wild strawberry has three leaflets and white flowers.

Flowering: June–September · Pruning: September

Why grow it?

• Flowers for a long time, from June into September, and gives nectar and pollen to hoverflies, small bees, bumblebees and butterflies.
• A food plant for the caterpillars of the grizzled skipper, a small butterfly that also uses other cinquefoils and wild strawberry.
• A tough ground cover for a wild strip, a bank or a flowering lawn: it tolerates mowing and trampling.
• A cheerful touch of yellow in a flowering lawn that you mow less often.
• Once a well-known plant in folk medicine, and the cinquefoil is a favourite motif in heraldry.

Creeping cinquefoil: where does it grow best?

• In the wild on verges and dykes, in grassland, pastures and lawns, along field margins, paths, ditches and woodland edges.
• Sun to half shade; it flowers best in full sun.
• Moist to moderately dry, fertile soil, often clay or loam. It tolerates soil that is wet for a while, and trampling.
• In the garden as ground cover on a bank, in a flowering lawn, a wild strip or under open shrubs; not in a border with small plants.

Goes well with

• Daisy: Together a flowering lawn from spring to autumn.
• Selfheal: Purple spikes in the same mown grass, loved by bumblebees.
• White clover: Another creeper for the flowering lawn, with plenty of nectar for bees.
• Bugle: Blue spikes in spring on the same moist soil, before the cinquefoil flowers.

Creeping cinquefoil: when and how to plant it?

1. Buy plants from a nursery that specialises in native plants, or take a rooted runner from a plant in your own garden or a neighbour’s.
2. Plant in March–April or September–October, 40–50 cm apart: the runners soon fill the space.
3. Sowing is also possible, in autumn or early spring, on loosened soil; press the seed in well. Seedlings grow more slowly than runners.
4. Water in and keep the soil moist until the plants have established.
5. Do not put it next to small, weak plants: if necessary, contain it with a path, a grass edge or a solid edging.
6. Never dig up plants from the wild, not even from a verge.

Care

Watering

Only while it establishes and in long dry spells.

Feeding

Not needed: on rich soil it spreads even more and flowers less.

Mowing

In a flowering lawn, mow every 3–6 weeks at 5–8 cm: it persists and flowers between cuts. In a meadow, mow once a year in late September and remove the cuttings.

Spreading

Simply pull out runners that go too far; they come away easily. Do it regularly and the work stays small.

Guiding runners

If you want it to cover a spot quickly, pin the runners to the ground with a bent twig.

Tip: Let creeping cinquefoil into a lawn you mow less often: mowing every four weeks at 6–8 cm gives you a lawn full of yellow stars without it looking untidy.

Pruning and mowing

Pruning months: September.

When: Mow in late September in a meadow or wild strip; runners can be shortened throughout the growing season.

How:

• Mow the meadow or wild strip and remove the cuttings.
• Cut or pull out runners that grow into borders or across paths.
• In a lawn, simply mow it with the rest.
• In a wild corner, leave some leaves and stems lying as shelter for small creatures.

Pruning: when and how · Pruning calendar and basic rules

Propagation

Runners

The easiest way: in spring or September, cut a rooted young plant off a runner and replant it straight away.

Seed

Sow in autumn or early spring, in a tray or where it is to grow.

Division

In spring, split older clumps into pieces and replant them elsewhere.

Creeping cinquefoil: how does it get through the winter?

Hardy to −30 °C.

• The leaves mostly die back; the plant overwinters as buds on the rootstock and at the nodes of the runners.
• Fully hardy, to about −30 °C.
• Old runners and leaves form a loose layer under which small insects and spiders overwinter.

Diseases and pests

• Spreading into borders: The runners creep between other plants. Pull them out regularly and keep a solid edging.
• In the lawn: If you want a perfect lawn, it is hard to get rid of. Dig it out, roots and all, and resow the bare patch, or accept it as a flower in your lawn.
• Few flowers: In deep shade or on very rich soil it mainly produces leaves. Give it more light and do not feed.
• Powdery mildew: In dry weather a white powder sometimes appears on the leaves. Harmless: leave it.

Through the year

• March: Plant or move rooted runners.
• April: New runners start growing. Contain them where needed.
• May: Shorten runners near borders.
• June: Flowering begins.
• July: Full flower. Hoverflies and bees on the flowers.
• August: Flowering. Keep runners in check.
• September: Last flowers. Mow in late September and remove the cuttings. Move young plants.
• October: Plant or divide.
• December: Rest.

Did you know?

• The cinquefoil, a stylised leaf with five leaflets, is a well-known motif in heraldry and in the tracery of Gothic church windows.
• Potentilla comes from the Latin potens, ‘powerful’, a reference to the former fame of cinquefoils in folk medicine.
• In a single season one plant produces runners a metre or more long, with a new young plant at every node.