Stems solitary or few, vine-like and climbing over other plants or sometimes erect and independent of support; herbage without hairs, somewhat dull grayish-green; rhizomes slender.
Perennial, rhizome; few slender stems, vine-like, often uses other plants for support; leaves with 3 to 5 pairs of broad, hairless leaflets, tendrils at leaf tips; elongated clusters of few to many white to pink flowers grow from the upper leaf nodes.
Habitat
Meadows, slopes, pine or spruce-aspen forests.
Flower Characteristics
Few to many small stems of flowers from upper leaf nodes; hairless, white to pink petals, 1/4 to 3/4 inch, tinged with pale purple or bluish to purple veins.
Leaf and Stem Characteristics
Simple or branched tendril at end of stem; 6 to 10 leaflets; wide egg-shaped, to 1-1/2 inches long and to 1/16 inch wide; smooth, hairless; pale above, whitish powdery below; pair of pointed, 1/3 inch long appendages (stipules) at base.
Fruit and Seed Characteristics
1/8 to 1/4 inch long; elliptic-oblanceolate (somewhat between rounded like an egg and having a rounded apex and tapering base).