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Portrait of Meadow buttercup

Nature · Wildflowers & flowers

Meadow buttercup

Native · flowers Apr–Oct · meadows, pastures and damp grassland

Ranunculus acris — Ranunculaceae

The tall, stately buttercup of hay meadows and permanent pasture, whose glossy golden flowers turn a field yellow in early summer. Of the three commonly confused buttercups it is the one that stands upright on a slender, unfurrowed stalk and never sends out runners. Its sap is acrid and blistering, so grazing animals leave it alone and it can take over an overgrazed paddock.

How to spot them

  • ▸Tall and upright, up to about 1 m, with branching stems carrying many flowers about 2 cm across
  • ▸Five glossy, buttery-yellow petals; the green sepals lie flat against the back of the flower
  • ▸Leaves rounded in outline but deeply cut into three to seven lobes; upper leaves narrower and stalkless
  • ▸No creeping runners at all, which separates it from creeping buttercup, and no swollen bulb-like base like bulbous buttercup
  • ▸Flower stalks are round and smooth, not furrowed with ridges as in creeping and bulbous buttercups

How to know it

Tall yellow flower of hay fields and old pasture with five glossy petals and deeply cut, palm-shaped leaves; the stem stands upright and there are no runners

Meadow buttercup, Ranunculus acris.

Left untouched in grazed fields because its sap contains protoanemonin, which is acrid and irritant to the mouth

Meadow buttercup — cattle and horses avoid it, so it can spread in overgrazed pasture.

The specific epithet 'acris' means 'sharp' or 'acrid', a warning about the taste of this golden field flower

Ranunculus acris — meadow buttercup.

Of the three yellow flowers that children hold under their chins, this is the tall one with a smooth, round flower stalk and sepals lying flat against the petals

Meadow buttercup. Creeping and bulbous buttercups have furrowed flower stalks.

Its genus name is the Latin for 'little frog', a nod to the damp places where many of its relatives grow

Ranunculus, from rana, a frog. Meadow buttercup is one of the genus.

Flowering from April to October, it is one of the commonest wildflowers of unimproved neutral grassland, forming dense yellow sheets in early summer

Meadow buttercup.

Quick-fire facts

  • •Family Ranunculaceae, from the Latin Ranunculus, 'little frog', a diminutive of rana
  • •The Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust gives a flowering season of April to October and a height of up to 1 m
  • •The sap contains protoanemonin, an irritant that blisters skin and mouth; it breaks down on drying, so buttercups in hay are far less harmful than fresh plants
  • •Livestock avoid it, which is why it becomes more common in heavily grazed pasture
  • •Plantlife says the buttercup name seems to come from a belief that the flowers gave butter its golden colour, and holding one under the chin to see whether you 'like butter' is still played
  • •The three common buttercups: meadow (tall, upright, no runners, smooth flower stalk), creeping (runners, furrowed stalk, damp ground) and bulbous (swollen base, sepals bent sharply back, earliest to flower)
  • •A typical plant of surviving hay meadows; an estimated 97% of lowland unimproved grassland in England and Wales was lost between 1930 and 1984 (Fuller 1987, cited by the JNCC)
  • •Bumblebees and hoverflies visit its flowers for pollen and nectar

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