Rhodiola cretinii - Green Roseroot

Green Roseroot is a small succulent mat-forming perennial herb with creeping stems. It is named for Monsieur Cretin, assitant physician and good friend of French physician and botanist Raymond Hamet. Flowering stems are simple, erect, 2-12 cm tall. Leaves are alternate, narrow-oblong or obovate-oblong, 7-10 x 1.5-2.5 mm, margin entire or shallowly 3-5-rounded toothed, tip rounded, blunt, or pointed. Flowers are borne in flower-clusters, about 1 cm across, at the top of the flowering stems. lowers unisexual, unequally 5-merous in male plants, rarely 4- or 6-merous. Sepals linear to subulate, 3-4.5 mm, tip blunt. Petals are greenish-yellow to greenish-red, linear-inverted-lanceshaped, linear-spoon-shaped, narrowly elliptic, or linear-obovate, 3.5-6 x 1-1.5 mm, tip blunt. Stamens are 10. Carpels are erect, narrowly ellipsoid, 5-7 mm, seeds numerous. Green Roseroot is found in the Himalayas, from E Nepal to Sikkim and SE Tibet, at altitudes of 3700-4300 m. Flowering: June-August.