Berchemia scandens
Alabama Supplejack
NATIVE
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Smooth, reddish brown stems
Credit: Milo Pyne. Used with permission.
FIELD ID CHARACTERISTICS:
Smooth, reddish-brown stems, useful in basketry. Fruits are slightly toxic.
Description: Deciduous, climbing, flexible, woody vine.
Leaves: Alternate, ovate or elliptic, shiny entire leaves, 4 to 8 cm long and 3 cm wide. Leaf venation strikingly parallel with 10 or more straight veins on each half of the leaf.
Flowers/Fruit: Small, inconspicuous flowers in panicles. Fruit an elliptic dark blue or black drupe, 5 to 7 mm long. Blooms April and May; fruits August to October.
Habit and Range: Floodplain forests, moist sandy woods, stream banks, flat woods, bottomlands, rich woodlands, mainly in the Coastal Plain.
Typical Max Plant Height (m):
Leaf Arrangement:
Alternate
Leaf Division:
Simple
Leaf Margin:
Entire
Leaf Shape:
Ovate,
Elliptic
Inflorescence Color:
Green,
White
Fruit Color:
Blue,
Black,
Purple
Lifespan:
Perennial
Group:
Dicot
Family:
Rhamnaceae / Buckthorn
Ecoregions Found In:
Piedmont,
Coastal Plain
