Rubus fruticosus

R. fruticosus is a very prickly, scrambling, woody shrub with a perennial root system and biennial canes. It grows up to 2 m or more tall and is extremely variable in leaf shape and plant form. Stems are variable, semi-erect canes, which grow up to 8 or 10 m long. The canes may be green, purplish, or red and have generally backward pointing thorns, and are moderately hairy, round or angled, sometimes bearing small, stalked glands. They are arching, entangling, and woody. Stems can root at the tips to form new plants and new stems grow from the base each year. Roots are stout, branched, creeping underground, growing vertically to a maximum depth of 1.5 m depending on soil type, from a woody crown up to 20 cm in diameter. Secondary roots grow horizontally from the crown for 30-60 cm, and then grow down vertically. Many thin roots grow in all directions from the secondary roots (Weber, 1995;Bruzzese 1998;Roy et al. 1998;Anon, 2001). The alternate leaves are divided into 3 or 5 serrated, shortly stalked, oval leaflets, which are arranged palmately, coloured dark green on top and pale beneath. Some taxa have the underside of leaves covered in pale hairs. Stalks and mid-ribs are prickly. Flowers are white to pink, 2-3 cm in diameter, with five petals and numerous stamens, in many-flowered clusters. In the northern hemisphere, R. fruticosus flowers approximately from May to August, in the southern hemisphere from November to April. The fruit is an aggregated berry, 10-20 mm long, changing colour from green to red to black as it ripens, made up of approximately twenty to fifty single-seeded drupelets. Seeds are deeply and irregularly pitted, oval, coloured light to dark brown, and 2.6-3.7 mm long and 1.6-2.5 mm wide.