Rubus flagellaris Willd.

Whiplash Dewberry; Northern Dewberry

Shrub

Perennial

Vascular

Northern Dewberry is a native woody perennial vine-like shrub in the Rose family (Rosaceae). It occurs in most of Alabama. Northern Dewberry occurs in pine woodlands, on roadside banks, in forest clearings, and in old fields. It is a perennial with a taproot. The stems are erect or more often trailing and rooting at the nodes. The stems are green or reddish in color, glabrous or stipitate glandular, and armed with a few scattered recurved prickles. Bristles are lacking. The leaves are alternate, petiolate, and 3-5 foliate. The leaves on floricanes (second year stems that produce flowers) are usually 3-foliate while those of the primocanes (first year stems that are sterile) are 5-foliate. The petioles are often armed with recurved prickles. The leaflets are ovate to lance-elliptic in outline, serrate, and pubescent to glabrous beneath. The main veins on the underside of the leaflet are often armed with recurved prickles. The two lateral leaflets are often lobed or incised on one side. The leaves of northern plants are deciduous while those of southern plants are semi-evergreen. Flowers are solitary or in 1-3 flowered cymes. The peduncles of the flowers are often armed with recurved prickles. Each flower has 5 pubescent sepals and 5 white petals. The fruit is an aggregate of drupelets. Plants in south Alabama have deformed looking fruit where the drupelets are dry and shriveled. Those in northern Alabama produce small but edible fruit.--A. Diamond

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Native

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