Potentilla reptans L., Creeping Cinquefoil

Account Summary

Growth form and preferred habitats

In common with related Potentilla species, P. reptans possesses a deep, branching rootstock as its perennating structure and it bears a persistent terminal rosette of 5(-7)-nate palmate leaves on long petioles. Although very variable in habit with growing conditions, the long, trailing, flowering stems and four or five (-15) red, prostrate, surface-running stolons rooting at the nodes, with palmate stem leaves mostly of five leaflets and stipules entire or rarely toothed, together make this an easy perennial to recognise (Harold 1994; Sell & Murrell 2014).

A vegetatively vigorous pioneer colonist of disturbed, well-grazed, trampled or bare ground, Creeping Cinquefoil often forms clonal patches or carpets at the edge of roads or concrete tracks. However, it also grows, competes well and persists amongst other vigorous colonising species in sunny, open, somewhat disturbed or compacted soil conditions in short turf lowland grasslands, or on dry bare soil or stony ground. It is also one of the most troublesome garden weeds due to its rapid spread and the depth and vigour of its roots (Salisbury 1964). It is sometimes an abundant competitive ruderal on gravelly lakeshores, on the margins and in openings in woods, hedge-banks, tracksides, or in old quarries, on roadside verges and waste ground.

P. reptans prefers a well-lit, damp but free draining, moderately fertile, mildly acid to basic calcareous soil, although to some extent it can tolerate semi-shade and dry or more moderately acidic conditions (Sinker et al. 1985; Hill et al. 1999).

Fermanagh occurrence

This perennial is frequent and widely scattered in lowland Fermanagh and elsewhere in the county off the peat. It has been recorded in 103 tetrads, 19.5% of the total in the VC. As the tetrad distribution map indicates, seven of the tetrads contain only pre-1975 records, but this is not believed to represent any real reduction in the presence of this otherwise frequent species.

Flowering and vegetative reproduction

In sunny situations, Creeping Cinquefoil flowers from June to September, producing solitary, bright yellow, 17-25 mm diameter flowers on long slender pedicels from prostrate, quickly rooting shoots. Each 5-petalled flower contains around 20 stamens and 60-120 ovules, with nectar secreted by the receptacle around the base of the stamens (Hutchinson 1972). The pollen and nectar attracts bees and flies. Although the flowers are fertile, seed set often fails because of a genetic self-incompatibility mechanism, making cross-pollination essential (Harold 1994). The fruit is a head of single-seeded dry achenes varying in number from 25-200, usually about 90 (Salisbury 1964). Although some reports suggest seed is transient, other studies suggest it persists for five or more years buried in soil (Thompson et al. 1997).

Thus P. reptans can reproduce by seed and even more effectively vegetatively by the production of numerous surface stolons or runners that spread rapidly and radially from the parent rootstock rosette. An individual stolon can travel 2 m or more in a season and develop rooted plantlets at c 15 cm intervals along its length. Removal of the aerial shoots and upper parts of the roots in the garden setting is ineffective as a weeding measure, since the deeper root remnants regenerate adventitious shoot buds and quickly re-establish the plant. Vegetative growth is especially active in damper ground and in wet seasons, and also in more shaded habitats where the ability to flower is reduced. The relatively light seed allows it to wind-disperse, although some is taken by birds or is carried in mud and soil (Salisbury 1964). In any event, the seed manages to rapidly colonise new sites, where it can again spread vegetatively to form clonal patches or larger carpets.

Hybrids

P. reptans sometimes coexists in disturbed ground alongside

P. erecta (Tormentil) and P. anglica (Trailing Tormentil) and several hybrid forms, intermediate in many respects, are known to occur. The two hybrids involved, P. × mixta (P. anglica × P. reptans) and P. × italica (P. erecta × P. reptans), are both sterile and are impossible to separate in the field. P. × italica is thought to be exceedingly rare, having only once been cytologically confirmed in Britain (Stace et al. 2015). However, some forms of the parent species can be very similar to their hybrids and, since the hybrids can display both morphological seasonal variation and apomixis in some circumstances, they really are only distinguishable on the basis of their very low or zero fertility (Czapik 1975; Stace 1975).

It is not surprising that these hybrids are only extremely rarely recorded in Ireland and RHN ad the current author (RSF) doubt if anyone has even looked for them in Fermanagh for the last half century. A map for P. × mixta s.l. plotted in the New Atlas is accompanied by a warning that these hybrids are under-recorded to an unknown and very obviously uneven extent throughout B & I (D.J. McCosh, in: Preston et al. 2002).

British and Irish occurrence

P. reptans is frequent and widespread in most of S, E & C Ireland, becoming less prevalent in the more acidic terrain of the W & NW, which is often peaty and infertile. In Britain, P. reptans is common throughout lowland England and Wales, but further N in Scotland, it becomes rarer and more coastal, and beyond the Clyde and Forth conurbations it is only sporadically present and then chiefly accidently introduced (New Atlas).

European and world occurrence

P. reptans has a widespread, almost continuous native distribution in warm temperate Europe stretching from the Mediterranean basin to the southern Baltic region of Sweden and Finland (Kurtto et al. 2004). It is also native in W Asia and N Africa, but it is believed to have spread with settlement both within and beyond its indigenous range. It has been introduced in Ethiopia, N & S America and New Zealand (Hultén & Fries 1986, Map 1122).

Threats

None.

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