Floating marshpennywort
Hydrocotyle ranunculoides · Aquatic plants
Up close · Photo: Cris Waller / CC BY
Also called Marsh pennywort, Floating pennywort, Water pennywort
How to identify Floating marshpennywort
- Round to kidney shaped leaves with 3 to 7 shallow lobes
- Leaf stalk attached at a notch in the leaf, not the center
- Tiny white flowers in small round clusters under the leaves
- Fleshy creeping stems that root at the joints and float
Similar plants
Water lilies and pond lilies have much larger leaves, and whorled marshpennywort has round leaves with the stalk in the center.
Growth profile
| Growing season | Grows from spring, spreads across the surface through summer, flowers from June to September, and survives mild winters as creeping stems. |
|---|---|
| Starts growing | About 50 F water |
| Light | Full sun to partial shade |
| Depth | Moist shoreline to 2 feet of water |
| How it spreads | Creeping stems, stem fragments and seeds |
| Habitat | Ponds, ditches and slow sloughs with nutrient rich mud at low elevations west of the Cascades. |
Why it matters in a lake
Native in Oregon but can build thick floating mats in nutrient rich ponds. Fragments root easily.
Where it is found
- Idaho: Not recorded
- Oregon: Occasional
- Wyoming: Not recorded
Classification
| Kingdom | Plantae |
|---|---|
| Phylum | Tracheophyta |
| Class | Magnoliopsida |
| Order | Apiales |
| Family | Araliaceae |
| Scientific name | Hydrocotyle ranunculoides |
American pondweed
Floating leaf pondweed
Yellow pond lily
Fragrant water lily
Water smartweed
Uruguay water primrose
Watershield
Water purslane
Floating primrose willow
Hairy watercloverNeed a hand?
Is it taking over your lake?
We identify what is growing, map how much of it there is and build a control plan that targets it without harming the rest of the lake.
Idaho / Wyoming (208) 501-4531Oregon (541) 280-0596