Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Rubus leightonii

Common name

Blackberry

Family

Rosaceae

Where found

Forest, woodland, grasslands, pastures, disturbed sites, roadsides, gardens, orchards, plantations, along streams and near swamps. Ranges and the eastern edge of the tablelands north of inland from Kiama. Rarely elsewhere.

Notes

Arching semi-deciduous shrub to 2 m high. Produces roots at the stem tips and suckers from the base. Forms dense thickets. Prickles to 5 mm long on stems (mainly on the stem angles), leaf stalks, sometimes on the lower surfaces of the leaves, occasionally on the sepals. Leaf margins sharply toothed. Fruit fleshy. Stems bluntly angled, with or without tufted hairs, glandular hairs usually easily seen. Leaves alternating up the stems, compound, with 3 or rarely 5 leaflets, (sometimes some joined), or with 1 or 2 leaflets on the stems that produce flowers. Leaflets  mostly 3.5–6.5 cm long, 20–35 mm wide, mature leaflets with upper surface green, becoming hairless, lower surface sparsely to moderately felted, bases wedge-shaped to cordate. Flowers pink, sometimes fading to white, with 5 petals each 12–16 mm long, not crumpled. Flowers in branched cylindrical clusters. Axis of the flower clusters hairy, but the hairs are not dense and erect. Flowering mainly late spring and summer. Fruit more or less round, initially green, ripening red, maturing black.

One of the in the Rubus fruticosus species aggregate.

A Weed of National Significance. General Biosecurity Duty with additional restrictions all NSW. Pest plant ACT. Noxious weed Vic, but only one (possible) sighting from Vic.

 PlantNET description:  http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Rubus~leightonii  (accessed 5 February, 2021)