Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Ligustrum sinense
Common name
Narrow-leaf privet, Chinese privet, Small-leaved privet
Family
Oleaceae
Where found
Rainforest and regrowth, urban bushland, open woodland, disturbed sites, roadsides, gullies, and along streams. Widespread, mostly in cities and towns, and along roads.
Notes
Introduced tree or shrub to 7 m high. Sometimes partly deciduous in colder areas. Fruit fleshy. Bark smooth. Young stems cylindrical, with prominent lenticels, hairy, becoming hairless. Leaves opposite each other, 1–13 cm long, 5–55 mm wide, mid to dull green, densely hairy to hairless, margins entire or wavy, tips pointed. Flowers fragrant, sickly sweet, white to cream with mauve to purple anthers, tubular, the funnel-shaped tube 0.5–2 mm long, with 4 lobes each 2-5.5 mm long. Flowers in branched clusters 4-11 cm long. Flowering: chiefly late winter to spring. Fruit dull purple or bluish-black when ripe, oval to round, 3-6 mm long.
General Biosecurity Duty all NSW. General Biosecurity Duty with additional restrictions in the Central Tablelands, NSW. Pest plant ACT.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Ligustrum~sinense (accessed 22 January, 2021)
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