Alchemilla triphylla Rothm.

Rosaceae, R. A. Graham. Flora of Tropical East Africa. 1960

Habit

A low shrub, 60–120 cm. high.

Stem

Stems woody, green towards the extremities, sometimes hidden by the stipules, thickly covered with ascending silvery-creamy hairs.

Stipules

Stipules reddish-brown, membranous, usually entire, more rarely apically dentate, wrinkled, glabrous but for a long-ciliate margin, or covered with long ascending hairs.

Leaves

Leaves flabelliform in outline, 3-lobed to the base or nearly so, variable in size, up to 1.5 cm. long and 1.3–2.2 cm. broad, with silvery-creamy hairs covering both surfaces but more silvery beneath; lobes obovate-cuneate or oblanceolate-cuneate, the lateral as large as the central one or only a little narrower, 3–7-dentate, with teeth up to 2 mm. deep but usually less and the central one the smallest, each with a terminal tuft of hairs; petioles up to 3 mm. long, but usually shorter, the leaves appearing sessile.

Inflorescences

Inflorescences 1–2-flowered, short, just emerging from the stipules.

Flowers

Flowers ± 3 mm. long (4 mm. fide Rothmaler); pedicels up to 1 mm. long.

Calyx

Calyx covered externally with long ascending yellowish hairs; calyx-lobes ovate-triangular, acute, 1.8–2 mm. long; epicalyx-lobes lanceolate, shorter than the sepals.

Fruits

Achenes 2.

Habitat

Upland moor, preferring damp places, often scrambling over rocks; 3150–3800 m.

Distribution

U2 the Belgian Congoconfined to Ruwenzori.