Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Rhamnus alaternus
Common name
Buckthorn, Italian Buckthorn
Family
Rhamnaceae
Where found
Dry forest, woodland, shrubland, grassland, plantations, disturbed sites, roadsides, rocky outcrops, dunes and coastal flats, and near streams. Sydney area. Occasionally elsewhere.
Notes
Introduced shrub to 5 m high. Leaf margins with sharp teeth. Fruit fleshy. Bark dark brown, furrowed. Younger stems hairy with simple hairs, or hairless. Leaves alternating up the stems, rarely almost opposite each other, 2–7.5 cm long, 5–40 mm wide, somewhat leathery, margins toothed, both surfaces hairless, upper surface dark green and glossy, lower surface paler, tips pointed. Male and bisexual flowers on the same plant, the majority being male. Flowers fragrant, greenish or yellow-green, to 3 mm long, with 0 or 4-5 petals, fused at their bases into a tube, and 5 tiny sepals. Flowers in small dense clusters 5–25 mm long. Flowers May–Oct. Fruit initially green, turning red, ripening black, blue-black, or brown, oval to globular, 3-7 mm in diameter.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Rhamnus~alaternus (accessed 4 February, 2021)
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