Rubus chamaemorus
 
Cloudberry

Male Plant
Flower Top

Warmup Shelter on Fir River Road, North-West of Hudson Bayy
18-June-2014

Note the keys to the family and the genus assume that all members of Rubus are shrubs.  However, this species is actually a herb.

Chamaemorus: Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora and Flora of Alberta leading to this species. 

plants less than 3 dm high; NOT [plants 0.5 ?2 m high]

stems herbaceous or somewhat woody at base, dying down annually; NOT [stems more or less woody]

stems not prickly

leaves merely lobed; NOT [leaves compound]

leaves rounded, shallowly several-lobed; NOT [leaves 3-5 foliolate], NOT [leaves pedate]

flowers unisexual; NOT [flowers mostly perfect]

petals spreading; NOT [petals erect]

 

Rubus: Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora  and Flora of Alberta leading to this genus. 

shrubs; NOT [herbs, or with a woody base and otherwise herbaceous], NOT [small trees]

plants generally taller than 5-15 cm

leaves compound, distinctly divided into leaflets; NOT [leaves simple]; NOT [leaves lobed, not distinctly divided]

leaves not linear-dissected; NOT [leaves dissected into linear divisions]

leaves with 3-5 leaflets; NOT [leaves with 5-11 leaflets], NOT [leaves with 11-17 leaflets]

sepal bractlets absent; NOT [bractlets alternating with the sepals]

flowers white; NOT [flowers pink or yellow]

carpels numerous; NOT [carpel 1], NOT [carpels mostly 5]

ovary or ovaries superior; NOT [ovary inferior]

hypanthium shaped like a saucer, cup or urn and free from the ovary; NOT [ovary enclosed in and adnate to the hypanthium]

fruit more or less fleshy; NOT [fruit dry]

carpels becoming drupelets (raspberry-like); NOT [carpels becoming achenes, enclosed in a fleshy receptacle]

 

Rosaceae: Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora  leading to this family. 

shrubs or trees; NOT [herbs]

plants NOT climbing

plants with normal leaves; NOT [succulent, spiny plants with leaves absent or scale-like, inconspicuous]; NOT [leaves all basal, and tubular or with tentacles for catching insects]

leaves alternate; NOT [leaves opposite]

leaves compound; NOT [leaves simple]

leaflets NOT leathery

leaflets NOT spinose-tipped

flowers with two floral rings, and with each petal distinct from the others

flowers perfect; NOT [flowers dioecious or perfect]

petals 5; NOT [petal (standard) solitary]

stamens numerous; NOT [stamens 5]

fruit NOT a legume