Common Name: Slender Cherry
Botanical Name: Exocarpus sparteus
Family: SANTALACEAE
Description:
Slender, often distinctively bronze-coloured, attractive shrub or small tree, 2-4 m high, with drooping branchlets. Narrow leaves when present (shedding early) 2-7 mm long. Pendulous branchlets are long, slender and yellow-green to orange in colour. Tiny flowers, sessile, in stalked spikes, 0.5-2 cm long, on branchlets. Throughout the year, but mainly spring. Rounded, dark nut on shiny, succulent, white to reddish, swollen, fruiting stalk (edible) that is broader than the attached nut. Summer.
Slender, often distinctively bronze-coloured, attractive shrub or small tree, 2-4 m high, with drooping branchlets. Narrow leaves when present (shedding early) 2-7 mm long. Pendulous branchlets are long, slender and yellow-green to orange in colour. Tiny flowers, sessile, in stalked spikes, 0.5-2 cm long, on branchlets. Throughout the year, but mainly spring. Rounded, dark nut on shiny, succulent, white to reddish, swollen, fruiting stalk (edible) that is broader than the attached nut. Summer.
Natural Distribution:
Scattered (never abundant) on sandy rises of lower rainfall regions in all mainland agricultural districts of SA. Extends into all mainland States and Territories. Common to mallee areas.
Scattered (never abundant) on sandy rises of lower rainfall regions in all mainland agricultural districts of SA. Extends into all mainland States and Territories. Common to mallee areas.
Notes:
Birds assist with the dispersal of the fruit (nut) being attracted to the swollen, sweet-tasting (edible) fruiting stalk. A root parasite requiring a host plant for survival.
Birds assist with the dispersal of the fruit (nut) being attracted to the swollen, sweet-tasting (edible) fruiting stalk. A root parasite requiring a host plant for survival.
