Ranunculus cantoniensis - Chinese Buttercup

Chinese Buttercup is a perennial herb with stems 20-65 cm, hairy, branched. Flowers are borne in compound asymmetrical cyme at branch-ends, 4-10-flowered; bracts leaf-like. Flowers are 0.9-1.3 cm in diameter. Flower-stalks are 1.2-12 cm, bristly, receptacle hirtellous. Sepals are 5, reflexed, narrowly ovate, 3-4 mm, bristly. Petals are 5, narrowly elliptic or obovate, 4-7.5 x 2-3.8 mm, nectary pit covered by a scale, tip rounded. Stamens are numerous; anthers oblong. Basal and lower stem leaves with leaf-stalk 4.5-20 cm, hairy; blade ternate, broadly ovate in outline, 3-14 x 3.8-17 cm, thinly papery, sparsely bristly; leaflets stalked, central leaflet rhombic-ovate or broadly ovate, broadly wedge-shaped or rounded-base flat, margin 3-partite, finely toothed; lateral leaflets obliquely broadly ovate, unequally 2-sect or 2-partite. Upper stem leaves are smaller, shortly stalked. Aggregate fruit is nearly spherical, 7-9 mm in diameter; carpels numerous. Chinese Buttercup is widely distributed around India, China, Vietnam, Hong Kong, Korea and Japan, at altitudes ranging from sea-level to 2000 m. It is found throughout the Himalayas, at altitudes of 100-1700 m. Flowering: March-September.