Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Leycesteria formosa

Flowers. Australian Plant Image Index, photographers RG & FJ Richardson, England

Flowers, fruit, and leaves. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg,  Errinundra National Park north of Orbost, Vic

Branch with purple bracts left after the flowers have fallen. Photographer Jackie Miles

Fruit and leaves. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg,  Errinundra National Park north of Orbost, Vic

Shrub. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg,  Errinundra National Park Vic, south of Delegate

Common name

Himalaya Honeysuckle

Family

Caprifoliaceae

Where found

Forest, woodland, gullies, along streams, and other moist places. Blue Mountains. Rarely elsewhere. Doubtfully naturalised in the ACT.

Notes

Introduced multi-stemmed deciduous shrub to about 2 m high. Fruit fleshy. Stems hairy with fine hairs or almost hairless, hollow. Leaves opposite each other, 5–24 cm long, 20–120 mm wide, hairy with minute hairs, margins entire or finely toothed, tips with long points. Flowers white or purplish, surrounded by purplish leafy bracts, 12 to about 20 mm long, with a trumpet-shaped tube and 5 lobes each 3–5 mm long. Flowers in compact drooping clusters 2–10 cm long, surrounded by purplish leafy bracts. Fruit dark red to purplish-black, oval to round, about 10 mm long. Flowers summer.

PlantNET description:  http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Leycesteria~formosa (accessed 22 January, 2021)