A modern reference to temperate woody plants, including updated content from this site and much new material, can be found at Trees and Shrubs Online.

Rhaphithamnus spinosus (A. L. Juss.) Moldenke

Modern name

Rhaphithamnus spinosus (Juss.) Moldenke

Synonyms

Volkameria spinosa A. L. Juss.; R. cyanocarpus (Hook. & Arn.) Miers; Citharexylon cyanocarpum Hook. & Arn.

An evergreen shrub or small tree, ultimately 20 or 25 ft high, with a dense growth and very leafy branches; young shoots covered with erect, bristly down and armed with axillary spines, which on the year-old branches become 12 to 1 in. long, slender and needle-like. Leaves opposite, often in threes, set about 14 in. apart, 14 to 34 in. long, 1 to 12 in. wide, broadly ovate, pointed, rounded at the base, dark green and glabrous above, pale beneath, with at first minute bristles especially on the midrib, also on the very short stalk. Flowers pale blue, produced in April singly or in pairs in the leaf-axils of the previous summer’s growth, each on a very short, bristly stalk. Corolla slender, tubular, 12 in. long; calyx bell-shaped, 112 in. long, toothed; stamens four, included within the corolla. Fruits 13 to 12 in. across, globose, bright blue.

Native of Chile and Argentina; introduced by W. Lobb about 1843. It is only hardy at Kew against a wall, and one must go to Ireland or the south-west to see it at its best. Its blue fruits are even more ornamental than its flowers.


Genus

Rhaphithamnus

Other species in the genus

[No species article available]