Photo: Rudolph89 — CC BY-SA 3.0 · source
Survives zone 8 through 9
Harvest calendar
Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.
A vigorous, viciously hooked forest-margin and swamp climber rather than a garden fruiting bramble — the small, blackberry-shaped fruit ripens yellow to red and is edible, though most sources describe the flavor as mild to insipid rather than genuinely sweet; early European settlers nonetheless used it for jams and jellies. Being dioecious, both a male and a female plant are needed for any fruit at all, so yields stay sparse even in ideal conditions.
- Hardiness
- Zone 8–9
- Habit
- Shrub
- Edible part
- Fruit
- Ripens
- Summer
- Mature size
- Woody evergreen climber to 10 m; hooked prickles — site away from paths
- Light
- Partial — forest-margin climber
- Soil pH
- 5.5–7.0
- Environment
- Temperate rainforest
- Native range
- Endemic to New Zealand, found on both the North and South Islands in swampy ground, forest margins and scrubland.
- Status
- Wild
- Years to fruit
- 3–4 yrs
- Growth speed
- Vigorous once established — a woody climber capable of reaching 10 m.
- Spacing
- 250 cm (98 in) apart — about 6.3 m² (67 sq ft) per plant
- Leaf shape
- Palmate, hand-shaped leaves with three to five toothed leaflets — shorter and broader than those of its close relative R. cissoides.
- Root system
- A perennial crown and shallow spreading root system in the top 30–40 cm, carrying biennial canes: each cane grows one year, fruits the next, then dies. New shoots come from buds on both the crown and the roots, which is why a bramble returns from root fragments left after digging and why it is so hard to remove once settled.
- Fruit description
- A small, blackberry-shaped aggregate fruit ripening from yellow through orange to red; edible, but generally described as mild or lacking in flavor rather than sweet.
- Propagation
- Easily propagated from layered stems and semi-hardwood cuttings; seed germinates after 4–6 weeks of cold stratification.
- Pollination
- ⚠ DIOECIOUS — needs male and female plants
The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.
Growing guide
Fertilizing. Not a heavy feeder — succeeds in ordinary damp, humus-rich ground without special soil amendment, though consistent moisture matters more than fertility.
How it spreads. Climbs via backward-pointing hooked prickles on its stems rather than spreading below ground — it hauls itself up into the forest canopy on other vegetation rather than forming a spreading colony.
Growing tips. Extremely thorny — the hooked, backward-pointing prickles that let it climb also snag clothing and skin readily, giving rise to the "bush lawyer" name; site it well away from paths and seating areas. Broadly tolerant of frost, sun, drought, shade and wind once established, and a genuinely large climber, capable of reaching 10 m.
Grow journal
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