Native Raspberry - native (Rubus parvifolius)

Family: Rosaceae (Rose family).

Native of Eastern Australia.

Occurrence: A plant of higher rainfall areas. Native Raspberry is rare in the drier forests.

Identification: it is similar in appearance to a small blackberry, and has a similar scrambling habit.

• it never grows in to a dense thicket
• the leaves are trifoliate, and the central leaflet is larger than the other two
• the fruit are smaller than those of the blackberry and ripen to a red colour.

Similar species: Blackberries have black fruit. Blackberries are generally larger and more robust plants, and can form dense thickets. The leaves (on the first-year canes) of blackberries are trifoliate or five-foliate e.g. like a 3-leaf or 5-leaf clover, with all of the leaflets about the same size and shape, and with leaf-stalks about the same length. The undersurface of the leaves of blackberries may be green or white.

Photo 1: Native Raspberry. The leaves are divided into unequal lobes, and are almost white underneath. Glenluce, beside the Loddon River.
2: Native Raspberry in fruit. Trapyard Gap.