Jättipoimulehti – Alchemilla mollis

As a family, alchemilla or lady’s mantles are easy to recognise by their palmate, or less frequently digitate, toothed, plicate (at least when young) leaves and abundant, small, greenish or yellow flowers that are grouped in rounded dense clusters, and further into a branching compound inflorescence. A closer look at the flowers reveals, among other features, a cupule receptacle and the four lobes of the calyx on the tip, like a crown, and the four lobes of the epicalyx spreading in between.

The micro-species of lady’s mantles is difficult to differentiate. Its seeds are produced apomictically, without genuine fertilisation. Many small but permanent, distinctly separate lines have therefore developed.  There are over one thousand worldwide, and almost 500 are permanently present in Europe. The alchemilla flora of Finland comprises about thirty species.