GrrlScientist is an evolutionary biologist, ornithologist, aviculturist, birder and freelance science and nature writer. A native of the Pacific Northwest, she relocated from Seattle to NYC with her parrots after earning a BS in Microbiology (emphasis in Virology) and PhD in Zoology (Ornithology) from the University of Washington. In NYC, she was the Chapman Postdoctoral Fellow at the American Museum of Natural History for two years, pursuing part of her "dream" research project by reconstructing a molecular phylogeny of the parrots of the South Pacific islands. GrrlScientist and her five parrots are currently relocating to Germany, where she will continue writing her blog while also writing a book and learning German. (Meanwhile, her parrots will continue to nibble on her extensive personal library.) If you appreciate GrrlScientist's writing, you can help pay her living expenses by hiring her to "blog" your conference, speak at your club or write articles for your publication (or by clicking on the Paypal button below). If you read an essay on this blog that you especially enjoyed, please nominate it for inclusion in 
tags: Potentilla fruticosa, Gardening, Horticulture, Botany, nature, Helsinki, image of the day
Is this a wild rose or a close relative?
"Goldfinger" or the Buttercup Shrub, Potentilla fruticosa.
Photographed alongside a roadway in Pitäjänmäki in northern Helsinki, Finland.
Image: GrrlScientist, 4 July 2009 [larger view]. (raw image)
"Goldfinger" -- which has a wide variety of common names, such as the Goldfinger shrubby Potentilla, Shrubby Cinquefoil and my favorite, the Buttercup Shrub -- is a hardy and dense shrub with dark green leaves and bright yellow flowers that are roughly 1 1/2 inch wide. The name comes from the Latin, cinquefolium ("five leaves") for the flowers' five petals. Flowers are flat and round, and come in a variety of colors, yellow being most common. Native to the Rocky, Cascade and Olympic mountains of the United States, these plants are popular ornamentals that flower continuously from June through October with little preference to soil or water conditions.
Life Science
Education
Comments
Looks like a Common Rock-Rose, a Helianthemum. Perhaps a variety of the H. nummularium found in the UK.
Posted by: John | July 8, 2009 5:01 PM
My guess is Potentilla fruticosa. Definitely in Rosaceae in any case.
Posted by: Diane | July 8, 2009 5:29 PM
Diane appears to be correct. I have a photograph of a flower of Potentilla (Dasiphora) fruticosa 'Goldfinger' which is pretty much identical.
Helianthemum has a single style with a capitate stigma. (And the shape of the anthers is different as well.)
Posted by: alias Ernest Major | July 8, 2009 5:40 PM