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Creeping Buttercup

Creeping Buttercup

Ranunculus repens

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How common: Very common

Creeping Buttercup is a low, spreading perennial with shiny, golden-yellow flowers. It grows in damp places and spreads by long runners that root where they touch the ground. Often seen in lawns, fields and along shores. Poisonous – do not eat.

Did you know?

  • It spreads quickly by creeping runners, which makes it a stubborn weed in lawns and fields.
  • A highly variable species: plants can differ a lot in size and leaf shape.

About the species

Identification

Low, creeping plant with many runners that root where they touch the soil. Stems 15–50 cm, lying or rising, smooth or slightly hairy. Leaves mostly on long stalks, in threes: the middle piece on a longer stalk than the side ones; each piece is deeply cut and toothed. Flowers single at the tips, 1.5–3 cm across, with five very glossy, golden-yellow petals; the flower stalks have fine lengthwise grooves. Later a small round head of many tiny hard seeds forms. Easy to tell from upright buttercups by its rooting runners. Flowers in Finland from June to August.

Plant group

Herbaceous plants

Habitat

meadow

Toxicity

A poisonous plant – do not taste it. Source: HUS Poison Information Centre (Finland), tel. 0800 147 111.

Flowering

Jun–Aug

About the habitat

Moist meadows and pastures, fields and gardens, riverbanks and lakeshores, wet woods and springy spots, as well as waste ground, yards and roadsides. Common throughout the country.

Sources

Photo: Unknown, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Creeping butercup close 800.jpg

Text: Pinkka: Verso- ja leviäintunnistus - Kaikki versot, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37896

Text: Pinkka: BIO-503 Suomen kasvisto ja kasvillisuus - Sisävedet: rantaniityt, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37896

Text: Pinkka: Kasvitieteen retkeily Ahvenanmaalle - Nåtö ja Västerskog, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37896

Text: Wikipedia (Finnish), CC BY-SA 4.0 https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%B6nsyleinikki

See also