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RE: Solanum aviculare

Tim Longville wrote:

I don't think I've ever grown actual S. aviculare. I certainly don't
at the moment. Though the general growth habit as you describe it
sounds very similar to my S.a. latifolium, the flowers definitely
don't. S.a.l. has pale blue-mauve flowers and they're not flat but
hooded or capped: more shy charm than extrovert razzmatazz. (not many
solanums go in for shy charm!) I wonder if this difference keys out in
a New Zealand flora. Does any Kiwi out there happen to know? Or would
he/she be kind enough to look'em up and tell us the results?

In response to Tim's request for more information I have looked in all my 
reference books. By far the most authoritative work on NZ trees and shrubs 
that I am aware of is "The Cultivation of New Zealand Trees and Shrubs" by 
L.J. Metcalf. This is what he says about S.aviculare:

A softly-wooded spreading shrub, 1.2 to 3 m tall. Glabrous in all parts. 
Branches green to purplish, terete; branchlets slightly angled. Leaves 
alternate, 5 to 30 cm long or sometimes longer, lanceolate to 
linear-lanceolate, entire to irregularly pinnatifid with 1 to 3 acute 
lobes, membranous to more or less coriaceous, dark green above, paler 
beneath, midrib and primary veins pale, distinct on both surfaces, petioles 
decurrent with the stem. Flowers lavender to almost white, in few- to 
many-flowered cymes, produced 1 to 3 in the axils. Calyx lobes short, broad 
and spreading; corolla broadly bell-shaped or almost flat, up to 3.5 cm in 
diameter, lobes about equalling the tubs, lanceolate. Filaments equalling 
or exceeding the anthers; anthers opening by slits at the tips. Berry 
drooping, 2 to 2.5 cm long, broadly ovoid, yellowish, seeds less than 1.5 
mm long, stone cell masses in the ripe fruit inconspicuous and larger than 
the seeds only when several are joined together.

S.laciniatum he describes as follows:

Very similar to S.aviculare but differing mainly in the following 
characters: the flowers are blue-purple, 4 to 5 cm in diameter, rather 
flat, the corolla lobes only about half the length of the tube and 
shallowly notched at the tips; seeds up to 2 mm long, the stone cell masses 
in the ripe fruit conspicuous and as large as, or larger than, the seeds.

In his general description he states that S.laciniatum has larger flowers 
and that they are generally of much better colour than those of 
S.aviculare. He does not mention the variety S.aviculare latifolium (or any 
other variety) at all and from his botanical description of S.aviculare it 
seems that this is a very variable plant in the wild.

Tim Dutton
"Raindrops", Main Road North, Kaitoke, Upper Hutt, New Zealand
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