Potentilla argenteaL.

Hoary Cinquefoilhoary cinquefoilsilver cinquefoilsilvery cinquefoil

WFO wfo-0001016312 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Potentilla argentea, photographed by Марина Садыкова
fig. a Марина Садыкова, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-06-12 / obs. 205695808

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

The specimen a real sheet, in a real collection

Herbarium
The New York Botanical Garden
Accession
01400781
Filed as
Potentilla argentea L.
Det. by
D. E. Atha 2012-01-01
Collected
D. E. Atha 2011-05-30
Origin
US
The sheet
View the digitised specimen (CC BY 4.0)

A real pressed plant, in a real collection, under the accession number above. Not an illustration of one. The holding institution does not serve this sheet’s image to third parties, so there is no photograph here. The record is real and the link goes to it. Where we hold no openly licensed sheet for a species this section is simply absent, and where a sheet never recorded who determined it, that field stays empty rather than being filled in. Roughly half of all herbarium sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 55 botanical countries

Regions where Potentilla argentea is native: Afghanistan, Altay, Amur, Buryatiya, Iran, Irkutsk, Kamchatka, Kazakhstan, Khabarovsk, Krasnoyarsk, Magadan, North Caucasus, Primorye, Sakhalin, Transcaucasus, Türkiye, West Siberia, Xinjiang, Yakutiya, Pakistan, West Himalaya, Albania, Austria, Baltic States, Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria, Central European Russia, Corse, Czechia-Slovakia, Denmark, East European Russia, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Kriti, Krym, Netherlands, North European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Norway, NW. Balkan Pen., Poland, Romania, Sicilia, South European Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye-in-Europe, Ukraine AfghanistanAltayAmurBuryatiyaIranIrkutskKamchatkaKazakhstanKhabarovskKrasnoyarskMagadanNorth CaucasusPrimoryeSakhalinTranscaucasusTürkiyeWest SiberiaXinjiangYakutiyaPakistanWest HimalayaAlbaniaAustriaBaltic StatesBelarusBelgiumBulgariaCentral European RussiaCorseCzechia-SlovakiaDenmarkEast European RussiaFinlandFranceGermanyGreeceHungaryItalyKritiKrymNetherlandsNorth European RussiaNorthwest European RussiaNorwayNW. Balkan Pen.PolandRomaniaSiciliaSouth European RussiaSpainSwedenSwitzerlandTürkiye-in-EuropeUkraine
Native distribution of Potentilla argentea, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Albania ALB EUROPE
Austria AUT
Baltic States BLT
Belarus BLR
Belgium BGM
Bulgaria BUL
Central European Russia RUC
Corse COR
Czechia-Slovakia CZE
Denmark DEN
East European Russia RUE
Finland FIN
France FRA
Germany GER
Great Britain GRB
Greece GRC
Hungary HUN
Italy ITA
Kriti KRI
Krym KRY
Netherlands NET
North European Russia RUN
Northwest European Russia RUW
Norway NOR
NW. Balkan Pen. YUG
Poland POL
Romania ROM
Sicilia SIC
South European Russia RUS
Spain SPA
Sweden SWE
Switzerland SWI
Türkiye-in-Europe TUE
Ukraine UKR
Afghanistan AFG ASIA-TEMPERATE
Altay ALT
Amur AMU
Buryatiya BRY
Iran IRN
Irkutsk IRK
Kamchatka KAM
Kazakhstan KAZ
Khabarovsk KHA
Krasnoyarsk KRA
Magadan MAG
North Caucasus NCS
Primorye PRM
Sakhalin SAK
Transcaucasus TCS
Türkiye TUR
West Siberia WSB
Xinjiang CHX
Yakutiya YAK
Pakistan PAK ASIA-TROPICAL
West Himalaya WHM

Not drawn on the map: Great Britain. We hold no public-domain boundary for this region, so it is listed rather than guessed at.

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Flowering 1,843 in flower of 2,212 examined

Proportion of examined Potentilla argentea in flower, by month
Month In flower Examined Share 95% interval
Jan 1 8 13% 2% to 47%
Feb 2 3 too few examined
Mar 3 24 13% 4% to 31%
Apr 22 100 22% 15% to 31%
May 311 414 75% 71% to 79%
Jun 712 767 93% 91% to 94%
Jul 334 360 93% 90% to 95%
Aug 203 238 85% 80% to 89%
Sep 121 133 91% 85% to 95%
Oct 101 117 86% 79% to 91%
Nov 31 43 72% 57% to 83%
Dec 2 5 40% 12% to 77%

Peak flowering in Jun. Each bar is the share of Potentilla argentea observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 1,843 of 2,212 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. One month has fewer than 5 examined observations, so no proportion is drawn for it. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Where it actually grows measured, from 1,993 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -19.0 °C -10.8 °C -1.6 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 20.6 °C 23.6 °C 27.5 °C
Annual rainfall 455 mm 647 mm 1,182 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 58 mm 106 mm 244 mm

It is found where winters are severely cold. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 1,993 research-grade observations of Potentilla argentea that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one. Climate from CHELSA V2.1 (Karger et al. 2017); occurrences from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 132 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Fragaria argentea (L.) Crantz
  • Hypargyrium argentatum (Jord.) Fourr.
  • Hypargyrium argenteum (L.) Fourr.
  • Hypargyrium canum (Jord. ex Boreau) Fourr.
  • Hypargyrium confine (Jord.) Fourr.
  • Hypargyrium decumbens (Jord.) Fourr.
  • Hypargyrium demissum (Jord.) Fourr.
  • Hypargyrium tenuilobum (Jord.) Fourr.
  • Pentaphyllum argenteum (L.) Nieuwl.
  • Potentilla argentata Jord. ex Verl.
  • Potentilla argentea f. angustisecta Th.Wolf
  • Potentilla argentea f. angustisecta (F.Saut.) Th.Wolf
  • Potentilla argentea f. cinerascens Th.Wolf
  • Potentilla argentea f. csapodyae Borhidi & Isépy
  • Potentilla argentea f. glaucescens Döll
  • Potentilla argentea f. latisecta (F.Saut.) Th.Wolf
  • Potentilla argentea f. latisecta Th.Wolf
  • Potentilla argentea f. magyarica Soó
  • Potentilla argentea f. multifida Tratt.
  • Potentilla argentea f. parviflora Waisb.
  • Potentilla argentea f. pusilla Vocke ex Zimmeter
  • Potentilla argentea f. septenata (Lehm.) Th.Wolf
  • Potentilla argentea f. serrata Peterm.
  • Potentilla argentea f. tenuiloba (Jord.) Guşul.

and 108 more.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.