Silver cinquefoil is a perennial herbaceous plant from the Rosaceae family. Other names: throat grass, catarrhal grass, white gourd, shiny galangal, silver foot
Description:
Perennial herbaceous plant with woody rhizome and longish fusiform root; stems emerge from the rhizome, erect or ascending, 15-30 cm in height, densely white-tomentose, basal, leaves on long petioles, drying out by the time of flowering, palmately five-dissected; stem leaves numerous, on short petioles, upper sessile, all leaves white-tomentose below, green above; stipules are lanceolate. Flowers in corymbose-paniculate inflorescence, on pedicels, medium-sized, within 1 cm in diameter, calyx and petals share 5; petals obovate, notched at apex, slightly longer than sepals, yellowish; fruits are wrinkled achenes. Potentilla blooms from June to September. Silver cinquefoil is found in upland meadows, hills, in light pine forests, less often in fallows.
Medicinal use:
For medicinal purposes, silver cinquefoil herb is used. It is part of the medicine M.N. Zdirenko, which is used in the treatment of bladder papillomatosis and anacid gastritis. In folk medicine, they drink a decoction of Potentilla herb for stomach pain, colds, pulmonary tuberculosis, high blood pressure, rheumatism, women’s diseases, venereal diseases, hernia, with myositis (inflammation of the sac), fumigate the smoke of a sick person, an ointment from grass powder with pork fat is used for furunculosis. In the past, silver cinquefoil was used for scrofula, when you were “overstrained”, for gargling.