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European globeflower

European globeflower

Trollius europaeus

Identify the European globeflower from a photo and log your finds with Florapass.

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How common: Common

European globeflower is a showy member of the buttercup family with bright, ball‑shaped yellow blooms. It grows in damp meadows, along streams and rivers, wet woods and mountain grasslands across much of Europe and into Asia. Note: all parts are poisonous.

Did you know?

  • Provincial flower of Lapland.
  • Its rounded bloom stays almost closed and only opens wide as it starts to fade.

About the species

Identification

A plant that comes back each year, 30–60 cm tall, with an upright, smooth, usually unbranched stem. Leaves at the base have long stalks; the leaf is 7–15 cm across and deeply split into five main parts, each further cut with sharp teeth. Upper leaves are smaller and less divided. Flowers are single or a few together, 2–5 cm across, a rounded yellow ball made of many overlapping yellow parts that hide the nectar. Later it makes clusters of many small, slightly curved pods with several seeds. The round, closed look separates it from open, cup‑shaped buttercups; orange garden globeflowers often have long narrow parts sticking out. Flowers in Finland from May to July.

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

May–Jul

About the habitat

Moist, rich ground: meadows, springs and seeps, stream and river margins, wet woodland and flood‑side thickets; also open mountain meadows and places where snow lingers. Often on lime‑rich soils. Common in northern Finland; scarcer further south.

Sources

Photo: Марина Садыкова, CC BY 4.0 https://www.gbif.org/occurrence/6235191556

Text: Pinkka: Kumpulan kasvitieteellisen puutarhan maantieteellinen osasto - Suomi, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37857

Text: Pinkka: BIO-503 Suomen kasvisto ja kasvillisuus - Tunturit: tunturikoivikot, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37857

Text: Pinkka: Kasvitieteen retkeily Ahvenanmaalle - Nåtö ja Västerskog, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37857

Text: Wikipedia (Finnish), CC BY-SA 4.0 https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kullero

See also