Al Schneider's Rocky Mountains Plant Descriptions

Common Yarrow
Achillea millefolium
Aster family (Asteraceae)

Yarrow spreads quickly and produces carpets of fine, fern-like leaves topped by clusters of delicate white flowers. The plant makes itself comfortable around homes and in wild lands. Yarrow has been used for thousands of years as a medicinal plant for treating everything from mosquito bites to reducing blood clotting time. The name refers to the myth that Achilles' heel was treated with this plant -- but it did not work and he died. "Lanulosa" is Latin for "wooly."


©2006 John R. Gwaltney, Southeastern Flora

Description

, 8-40" tall, with white flowers (sometimes pink) with yellow disks. Tiny flowers collectively create flat-topped flowerhead clusters. Leaves are highly aromatic, , fern-like, 2-3 times divided into fine segments. Single or clumped stems, branched near top and covered with soft, woolly hairs arise from below the ground.

Field Marks

White flat-topped flowerheads and fern-like leaves.

© Al Schneider

A perennial plant lives and blooms for many years.

A herb is a plant whose stems die back to the ground in the winter.

pinnate -- A compound leaf with two rows of leaflets.

genus -- A subdivision of a botanical Family in which all members have a significant number of similar characteristics.

alternate -- leaves alternate along the main stem and are attached singly.

rhizome -- root-like stems that may either grow horizontally at the soil surface or in other orientations underground.