Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Rubus leucostachys
Common name
Blackberry
Family
Rosaceae
Where found
Forest, woodland, grasslands, pastures, disturbed sites, roadsides, gardens, orchards, plantations, along streams and near swamps. Widespread, but coastal only south from Eden. No records from the Western Slopes west of the Hume Highway.
Notes
Introduced spreading or trailing, sometimes arching, semi-deciduous shrub to 3 m high. Sometimes scrambling. Produces roots at the stem tips and suckers from the base. Forms dense thickets. Prickles to about 10 mm long on stems (mainly on the angles), leaf stalks, sometimes on the lower surfaces of the leaves, and sometimes on the sepals. Leaf margins sharply toothed. Fruit fleshy. Stems angled, hairy, and sometimes with long-stalked, reddish, glandular hairs. Leaves alternating up the stems, compound, with 3 or 5 leaflets, sometimes some joined, sometimes leaves on the stems that produce flowers with only 1 or 2 leaflets. Leaflets mostly 4–9.5 cm long, 30–80 mm wide, bases wedge-shaped to cordate, upper surface green, becoming hairless, lower surface varying from not felted to felted grey-green and with few to many longer hairs. Flowers pink or white, with 5 petals each 11–19 mm long, broad elliptic to nearly round, usually crumpled. Flowers in 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, about 15 mm in diameter.
One of the species 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.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Rubus~leucostachys (accessed 5 February, 2021)
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