Cimicifuga racemosa flowers. plants.oaklandnursery.com (Accessed 1/2018).

Cimicifuga racemosa (black-Cohosh) roots. Ayur Times Health Care. ayurtimes.com (Accessed 1/2018).

Cimicifuga racemosa is a perennial herb, 1-2.5 m tall, from a knotty rhizome. 

Cimicifuga racemosa leaf. © Copyright Steve Baskauf, 2002-2011. discoverlife.org (Accessed 1/2018).

Leaves alternate, 3-parted, each segment pinnately once or twice compound, leaflets toothed, lobed, 3-10 cm long. 

Flowers white, small, sepals 5, to 0.5 cm long, no petals, stamens white, numerous to 1 cm long; inflorescence 20-80 cm long, branched; blooms Aug.-Sept.

Cimicifuga racemosa flower close-up. © John Pickering, 2004-2017. discoverlife.org (Accessed 1/2018).

Fruit dry capsules 0.6-0.9 cm long with several seeds. No apparent seed dispersal mechanism. Migration to distant or disconnected forest sites is slow to non-existent (Matlack 1994). 

Cimicifuga racemosa (Actaea r.) black cohosh. fruit. en.wiktionary.org 004 (Accessed /2018).

Wetland status: UPL. 

Frequency in NYC: Infrequent. 

Origin: native. 

Habitat: Upland woodlands. A forest interior herb (Matlack 1994). 

Notes: Poisonous. Plants in the genus Cimicifuga have recently been included in the genus Actaea. Used as a remedy for menopausal hot flashes. According to https://articles.extension.org, “Common diseases found on black cohosh consist of several leaf spots and root rots, including rhizoctonia. Rhizoctonia solani can cause damping off of young, emerging black cohosh seedlings”.