Alchemilla catalaunica

Alchemilla catalaunica is a perennial herb of the rose family (Rosaceae) belonging to the Alchemilla vulgaris aggregate of lady's-mantles, a complex of closely related apomictic microspecies. It is a low, clump-forming plant arising from a stout woody rhizome, bearing long-stalked basal leaves that are rounded and palmately lobed with toothed margins, the lobes typically shallow and the surfaces somewhat hairy. Like other lady's-mantles its leaf shape and pleated, funnel-like young foliage characteristically collect beads of dew or guttation water at the centre. In summer it produces airy branched clusters of tiny yellowish-green flowers that lack petals, the floral parts reduced to a small greenish calyx, followed by minute single-seeded dry fruits. It grows in mountain grasslands, meadows and rocky slopes, its distribution centred on the mountains of the Iberian Peninsula and adjacent Europe.