Anemone cylindrica - Thimbleweed - 3" Pot

Thimbleweed is an herbaceous perennial in the buttercup family that is best suited for sites with full sun to part shade and dry or well-drained soil. This plant has a tidy form, producing a whorled basal rosette of deeply lobed leaves, and slender flowering stalks that reach 1-2 feet in height. The flowering stalks are typically leafless and each support one greenish white flower that blooms in early summer. By mid to late summer the flowers develop into the long, slender, thimble-like seed structures for which the species is named.

Anemone cylindrica can look similar to its relative A. virginiana, or tall thimbleweed, but the seed structures on A. cylindrica are much longer and narrower compared to the short rounded seed structures of A. virginiana. Throughout fall and winter the wind teases apart the seed head, transforming the structure into a tuft of cotton which helps the plant distribute its seeds. This characteristic provides thimbleweed with lasting visual interest.

This species is allelopathic– its roots produce a chemical called protoanemonin which can inhibit the germination of other species' seeds.