Nightshade Family (Solanaceæ)
(A) Bittersweet; Nightshade (Solanum Dulcamara) (European), although an immigrant, is quite common in the eastern half of our country. It chooses for its habitat moist thickets or the edges of ponds where there are plenty of shrub to help support it, for this species has weak stems.
The dark-green leaves are variable in form; some are lobed, others have small lateral leaflets, and still others have another pair of still smaller leaflets on the leaf stem. The flowers hang in loose clusters on long peduncles from the axils of the leaves. This species blooms from June until September.
(B) Black Nightshade (Solanum nigrum) is a native species with a smooth, erect, branching stem 1 to 2 feet high. The long-stemmed ovate leaves have a wavy-lobed edge. The five-parted white flowers grow in few-flowered clusters from the leaf axils, the round berries are black when fully ripe, and are quite poisonous. This species is found throughout our range.
Purple Thorn Apple (Datura Tatula) is a large, ill-scented, rank-growing weed with a stout, smooth stem from 1 to 5 feet high. The long-stemmed leaves have very irregular, coarsely toothed outlines. The lavender-colored, trumpet-shaped flowers are about four inches long. The flaring corolla has five broad, sharply pointed lobes and is seated in a light-green, five-parted calyx about half its length. Usually the color of the corolla is more intense on the lobes and often shades to white toward the base of the tube. After flowering a large green fruit capsule about two inches long appears; it is ovoid in shape and armed with stout prickles. The entire plant has poisonous juices. It grows in waste ground, especially about barnyards, from Me. to Minn. and southward.
Thorn Apple; Jimson Weed (Datura Stramonium) also comes from across the water; it is very similar to the preceding, grows in the same places and in the same range. The flowers are white and the leaves are lighter green; the stem is also somewhat stouter.