Tall bugbane (Cimicifuga elata) COSEWIC assessment and status report: chapter 3

Species Information

Name and classification

Scientific name:
Cimicifuga elata Nutt
Common name:
Tall Bugbane, Western Bugbane, or Black Cohosh
Family name:
Ranunculaceae; Buttercup family
Major plant group:
Dicot flowering plant

Fifteen species of Cimicifuga are known globally (Hay & Beckett, 1978), and the genus is circumboreal. Six of these species occur in North America, two on the west coast, including C. elata, and three on the east coast and the southern U.S. (Evans, 1992). Cimicifuga elata was the first member of the genus to be found in western North America (Ramsey, 1965). It was first observed and collected on the Lewis and Clark Expedition in 1805 in Oregon. The other nine species of Cimicifuga occur in Europe and the Far East. All of the North American species are endemics or are at least, infrequently distributed, except for C. racemosa, which is common in the east.

Description

Cimicifuga elata is a perennial, understorey plant that stands 1 to 2 m tall (Fig. 1; Hitchcock et al, 1964). Stems are branched above with glandular swellings at leaflet and stem joints, and leaves are large, thin, and bi-ternate. The 9 to 17 leaftlets are cordate to ovate, often palmate, and 5 to 7-lobed (usually 3-lobed) with serrate to dentate margins. Leaves are rough-hairy on top, and smooth below. The plant is finely pubescent, and somewhat glandular above with a dark, tuberous, horizontal rhizome, up to 10.2 cm long and 2.5 cm in diameter. The inflorescence is a simple to compound raceme (sometimes paniculate) with 50 to 900 small, white, closely-crowded flowers (Pellmyr, 1986).  Individual flowers are radially symmetrical and apetalous. Pedicels are shorter than the flowers, and sepals are white or pinkish, falling off at once. When the sepals fall away, only the stamens and pistils remain, and the inflorescence appears like a bottle brush. Fruits are follicles, 9 to 12 mm long, subsessile, appearing singly in the upper flowers, but in two’s, and rarely, three’s in the lower ones of the raceme. Follicles each contain approximately 10 red to purple-brown seeds. Cimicifuga elata may be confused with a few other understorey plants in the vegetative form, such as Actaea rubra, however, when flowering, it is very distinctive.

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