Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Print Fact Sheet

Rhaphiolepis indica

Common name

Indian Hawthorn

Family

Rosaceae

Where found

Margins of rainforest, urban bushland, woodland, roadsides, disturbed sites, gardens, coastal environs, and along streams. Coastal north from Batemans Bay, mainly in the Sydney area and north. Blue Mountains along the Great Western Highway

Notes

Introduced shrub or tree to 4 m high. Leaf margins often sharply toothed, particularly in the upper half. Fruit fleshy. Young stems often covered with fine brown hairs, becoming hairless. Older stems with prominent lenticels. Leaves alternating up the stems, usually crowded towards the ends of the branches, 3–8 cm long, 5–40 mm wide, leathery, hairless or hairy at first. Flowers white to pinkish, with 5 petals each 5-12 mm long. Sepals often red, falling before the fruit ripens. Flowers in dense, often branched, clusters 40-80 mm long, at the tips of the branches. Flowering: spring. Fruit bluish to bluish-black or purplish-black, round, 5–10 mm in diameter.

Family was Malaceae.

General Biosecurity Duty all NSW.

PlantNET description:  http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Rhaphiolepis~indica (accessed 4 February, 2021)