A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2007 HELP ID plant, please?

I have a plant growing in my northern Texas garden that I think should be a bush, but it has been allowed to grow several thinish trunks upward and now overhangs the roof. The leaves are light green and almost glossy, not quite heart shaped, and in the winter (now, in other words) it produces small bunches of purple fruit that hang like miniature grapes (about the size of holly berries) that are a sort of dusty purple. I have a new puppy (8 mos) and I desperately need to know if this plant is poisonous to small dogs (11 lbs). I have a picture but do not know how to insert it. I will try to insert the URL. pic of berryplant The wind was blowing, but the pic shows both the fruit and the trunks.
Thank you in advance for your help! I'm really worried, as some of the berries are falling on the ground now, and the pup is interested.

Hello wfg506,
I just wanted to Welcome you
to The Garden Helper's Forum!!
I am not sure what that plant is,
I think the the berries are a great
color and it looks like a healthy bush.


Weezie

Thanks, weezie, but the poisonous aspect (or not) is of more concern to me than that the plant appears healthy, which it does, of course!

Hello again wfg506!!
We have alot of gardeners here from beginners
to Master Gardeners, someone will undoubtly come
through and hopefully give you an answer...
Maybe Papito or Bill..........
We have a few members from Texas as well, Njoynit, Peppermint lily, and TexasWildFlower...
They may have seen it and can answer you a
little bit better than I could!!!
Once Again, Welcome aboard!!!
Weezie

Welcome aboard wfg506. I don't know what your plant is but I found this info about poisonous plants in Texas. Maybe its moonseed? That's the only one that sounds like it. We have a couple of Texans in the forum, hopefully they can chime in soon. Anything to help a fellow gardener and dog lover!

Texas poisonous plants

I'll have to locate my tree book,but can also carry a limb of it to your extension office and they can tell you for sure but will keep looking for book....I'm also makeing candles at the same time and need to pop off here but will leave pic open on comp and find book and look in there

evergreen huckleberry?it looks like it but the pic shows a brighter purple color so may just be a camera thing but the leaves look to match?what color flowers does it get?have you seen them?

I think that it's a elderberry but check it out for yourself! If it is elderberry it's not poisionous! Sorry I don't have a link for you I'm in a bit of a rush try going to goggle and doing an image search for "elderberry"!
Hope that this helps!

Any of the elderberries that we have here,
the flowers are in a round shape like that of a hydrandea or queen annes' lace, and so ends up the fruit cluster...
If it's a different variety, ?? I'm not sure.....
As they do acrossed the country, change,
It's not the one I'm firmiliar with here in the North.........

Also, FYI,
Most parts, believe it or not of the elderberry bush is poisonous, the only thing that is
edible on them is the "RIPE" berries,
I've read even the unripened berries are poisionous!!!
I never knew that until I read it, I usually couldn't wait for the berries to ripen when
I was a kid, and ate them when they were black and some were a purple~ish/berry/red color, so, now I
know what happened to me!!!! :p

Weezie

To weezie13, lizheaemma, njoynit and gardengal, thank you so much for responding so promptly. I have looked at every picture of elderberry I can find and the leaves are wrong. The scary moonseed leaves are also wrong, and the berries are the wrong color. I'm afraid I didn't pay any attention to the flowers on this plant this year, so I don't think they can be very demonstrative. The berries are the purple shown in the picture, and they look dusty until they ripen more fully, when they take on a darker purple look. This plant was here when I bought the house, but was a smallish bush at the time. It just loved the Texas summer heat (and flourished despite not being watered regularly) so I decided to let it spread out. Later, I had part of it cut back, and it then decided to act like a tree with several trunks.
Again, thank you for your suggestions, and keep them coming, if you can.
wfg506

wfg506,
Do you have any neighbors that knew the
previous owners of the house, that might
have come over for visits and they might know.

Or take a good portion of the limb
*still have leaves on it this time of year??*
to the local co~operative center??
They may know....

Or are you new to the state?
Do you anyone you work with that gardens?
They maybe able to give you some insight as well.
Or find a couple of "well seasoned" gardeners, they've lived in the area, they've gardened, most of the time they'll know if no one knows....

Please keep us posted if you do any of these,
we really like to solve these mysteries!!!

Weezie

Hi wfg!
All that I can do for you is to give you a wild guess as to the family, but not the particular species.
Your plant appears to have a lot of the same characteristics as the Salal (Gaultheria shallon) that grows wild around here. Do the flowers on your plant look anything like these typical Gaultheria blooms? Gaultheria berries are edible, but not what I'd call yummy....

OOOOOOOOOOOohhhhhhhhhhh what pretty flowers!!!!
I like that one alot!!
Weezie

Hi Bill and Weezie,

I'll try to find out where my extension office is and take a branch to them. I did a 'berry' search in a database, and the closest I could come up with, from the picture and description, was a viburnum - specifically, v. lentago (nannyberry/sheepberry). The leaves are similar (but NOT exact) and one description of the fruit was similar - but, again not close enough for me to be satisfied that I had actually pinpointed it. These leaves are "solid", the way hedge leaves are - not flimsy, lacy, fringed, etc. The edges are smooth. Best I can do for now.

If I can get to the ag people today, I'll let you know. Otherwise, will have to wait until Monday.
pic two

Again, thanks to all for your help!
wfg506

The leaves seem very shiney and smooth.
Not sure about bills leaves, they look different.

The leaves remind me of rhodendrons,
I know it's not one of those,
But shiney sort of.......????????.......

Bill, we've got to get back out there
and keep looking!!

We'll also have to call out the BigGuns!!

We have got to get Papito and Karen in on this!!
Oh, calling all Mystery Finders.........
Anybody out there???

Weezie

Hi,

Is it a Ligustrum? Check out these 2 links one is for the flower and the other for the fruit

http://www.invasive.org/browse/detail.cfm?imgnum=2307087

http://www.invasive.org/browse/detail.cfm?imgnum=2307088

Oh, the sight said that the berries are poisonous.

I think you've got it!!
Sure looks like it to my eyeball!!!

Hey Bill whattya think???????????


wfg506, What do you think??????

Weezie

To: rue anemone and all!

WOW! Thank you! Thank you! What a tremendous group of people you all (or, "youall" as we Texans say!)are. The minute I read rue anemone's post, the word 'ligustrum' struck a bell, and, sure, enough, the pictures are exactly what I have, and, apparently, the berries ARE poisonous.

I've kept my little Calli away from that side of my patio, and we're doing o.k., but I will have to have the plant removed, because I cannot take the chance.

Thank you so much for your good-hearted help!
wfg506