Atropa belladonna and other wild Nightshades

[scotchnaga85]

Plant the henbane this year... If you get the seed within the next 3/4 weeks then plant. Henbane typically grows over a 2 year period, a rosette of very large sticky leaves in the first year, and in it's second year it will flower with the snaking stems. Henbane doesn't like water logged soils. It loves nutrient rich soil, it's even been seen growing on rubbish dumps.

Deadly nightshade can grow into a large bush, but often it's found only as small shrubs sometimes not much bigger then habanero bush deadly nightshade prefers chalky soils in the wild.

Full to partial shade for the deadly nightshade.

Full sunshine for the henbane.

As is fairly typical with a lot of solanaceae both like disturbed soils.

 

[scotchnaga85]

Plant the henbane this year... If you get the seed within the next 3/4 weeks then plant. Henbane typically grows over a 2 year period, a rosette of very large sticky leaves in the first year, and in it's second year it will flower with the snaking stems. Henbane doesn't like water logged soils. It loves nutrient rich soil, it's even been seen growing on rubbish dumps.

Deadly nightshade can grow into a large bush, but often it's found only as small shrubs sometimes not much bigger then habanero bush deadly nightshade prefers chalky soils in the wild.

Full to partial shade for the deadly nightshade.

Full sunshine for the henbane.

As is fairly typical with a lot of solanaceae both like disturbed soils.
Isn't tobacco native to your part of the world? That's another nightshade.

 

[Helvete]

Plant the henbane this year... If you get the seed within the next 3/4 weeks then plant. Henbane typically grows over a 2 year period, a rosette of very large sticky leaves in the first year, and in it's second year it will flower with the snaking stems. Henbane doesn't like water logged soils. It loves nutrient rich soil, it's even been seen growing on rubbish dumps.

Deadly nightshade can grow into a large bush, but often it's found only as small shrubs sometimes not much bigger then habanero bush deadly nightshade prefers chalky soils in the wild.

Full to partial shade for the deadly nightshade.

Full sunshine for the henbane.

As is fairly typical with a lot of solanaceae both like disturbed soils.
Isn't tobacco native to your part of the world? That's another nightshade.

I do live in tobacco country, some farmers around here still grow it and my mom's family were tobacco farmers for quite a long time into the 20th century.  However, it doesn't grow wild.  Wild tobacco only grows in drier climates in the American southwest and Mexico.  There are some similar wild plants around here that we call "rabbit tobacco" and "skunk cabbage" but I don't think those are actually nightshades.
 
I had thought I read that henbane was a biennial like the daturas so I'll go ahead and plant those as soon as I get them.  I found another Jimsonweed plant this afternoon and went ahead and put one in a container, I'm curious how it will take an overwintering.  I've been trying to find as much info as I can about wild nightshades in Virginia and seems like a hard search to pinpoint using the internet....so I'm probably going to order a book.
 
EDIT:
so far I've read about four species that grow wild here, although I've never seen dulcamaras at all.
D. stramonium
S. carolinense
P. virginianum
S dulcamara
 
So...I'm going to dedicate an entire Saturday to locating the Physalis and the dulcamara, I have a few good sites I can check.

 

[Hybrid Mode 01]

     Rich, here is the dulcamara I was talking about.
 
 
Flowers and berries. It has a lot of fruit that is further along than this.

 
 
 
Interesting foliage. Leaves are really variable in shape, like a mulberry or hawthorn.

 
 
 
Pretty beefy stem. My wife and I moved into our current house four years ago and the plant was there then. If I had to guess how old it is based on initial size and growth rate, I'd say at least six years old.

 
 
     This plant is growing on the west face of a dense privet hedge, about 15' from our house (house is west of the hedge). So it gets direct sunlight for about four or five hours a day. It seems very drought (last three summers) and cold (last winter) tolerant. Aside from trying not to butcher it when I shear the hedge, I give it no special care and it is very healthy - currently growing over the top of the 6' tall hedge.

 

[scotchnaga85]

     Rich, here is the dulcamara I was talking about.
 
 
Flowers and berries. It has a lot of fruit that is further along than this.

 
 
 
Interesting foliage. Leaves are really variable in shape, like a mulberry or hawthorn.

 
 
 
Pretty beefy stem. My wife and I moved into our current house four years ago and the plant was there then. If I had to guess how old it is based on initial size and growth rate, I'd say at least six years old.

 
 
     This plant is growing on the west face of a dense privet hedge, about 15' from our house (house is west of the hedge). So it gets direct sunlight for about four or five hours a day. It seems very drought (last three summers) and cold (last winter) tolerant. Aside from trying not to butcher it when I shear the hedge, I give it no special care and it is very healthy - currently growing over the top of the 6' tall hedge.

 
Ah that looks like woody nightshade A prolific and very common weed over here. We also get black nightshade, its of the same branch of the nightshade family. 
Tobacco is grown over here as a garden plant, and like most nightshade plants its an expert escape artist I recently saw one growing from the cracks in between the concrete paving slabs that line our streets. The front garden 2 doors up was growing it
 
i have some pictures on my phone of some unidentified non native but growing wild Physalis plants.

 

[Helvete]

Heh, I identified my little skunk striped plant today.  Definitely not a nightshade, it's actually an evergreen and it's a very beneficial herbal plant to have around.  Called Pipsissewa.
 
Spent three hours in the woods today....not a good place to find wildflowers but found a few good sites for fern species I might try to ID.
 
Still looking for dulcamaras around here, I dunno if I'm gonna find them...no one local seems to have ever seen them when I show pictures.  Might have found information for a site for Virginia ground cherry (Physalis virginianum) but they could also be escaped tomatillos, not sure yet I'll have to go look at them myself.
 
I located a massive datura near my road today, gonna stop and get a pic of it in the morning, the thing is probably around a meter--4 feet tall loaded with white trumpets and may have some thornapples already (if someone wants seeds).

 

[scotchnaga85]

Sorry dude I forgot about uploading these...






Clearly an escaped plant but from where who knows.,. It's well established as a weed growing along the field edge.

 

[Helvete]

very cool Physalis
 
a THP member is sending me some Physalis peruviana seeds
 
I'm waiting patiently for my seed order to arrive of two species of mandrake (white and black), Scopolia carniolica, henbane, jerusalem cherry, and something else can't remember
 
also I'm on the lookout for both information and seeds about the Fire and Ice plant Solanum sisymbriifolium.  I'd like to know it's origins etc.  according to wikipedia it's edible and is a good companion plant because it's spiked.

 

[scotchnaga85]

very cool Physalis
 
a THP member is sending me some Physalis peruviana seeds
 
I'm waiting patiently for my seed order to arrive of two species of mandrake (white and black), Scopolia carniolica, henbane, jerusalem cherry, and something else can't remember
 
also I'm on the lookout for both information and seeds about the Fire and Ice plant Solanum sisymbriifolium.  I'd like to know it's origins etc.  according to wikipedia it's edible and is a good companion plant because it's spiked.

I've never heard of that fire & ice one before, I'll have to google it :-)

Egyptian Henbane, and Yellow Henbane are two others you might like

 

[scotchnaga85]

I saw patch of this growing by the road side and thought of this thread

It's solanum nigrum A.K.A black nightshade. Its very common but not as common as woody nightshade.

 

[Helvete]

I started a video series!
 
http://youtu.be/GrJPz1ABbKM

 

[Helvete]

I've got four Datura stramonium plants blooming right now
 

 

[scotchnaga85]

I've got four Datura stramonium plants blooming right now
 

Great shot & a beautiful flower.
I saw this today growing at the park near to home. I'm sure I threw a few seeds in the flower bed 5 years ago, but nothing grew, until now :-)

(Henbane)





And also there was loads if this growing on old scrub land about a mile from the nearest houses.
They have recently been building a new exit for a highway, the land this was growing in had been used as a depo for the construction crew, the scrub was cleared and ground disturbed.

 

[Helvete]

Henbane?  looks more like a Physalis species
 
also, here's part two

 
you can see my two Datura species in the opening shot

 

[scotchnaga85]

The first one is henbane, the other is a wild "naturalised" Physalis species.

 

[Helvete]

heh, here's a load of moonflower seeds, about to get a peroxide bath before they get dried out.  A couple of the thornapples were rotting...I'm sure the seeds will be fine but I'm hoping some of the mold will get killed by the H2O2 so I'm not dealing with it when they're germinating.  If the peroxide makes them wonky I've got another 100+ thornapples I can pick, plus I already have live plants to work with.
 

 

[John1234]

Hey hey, you're alive!
 
 
Which Penguin Classic is that?

 

[Helvete]

Hey hey, you're alive!
 
 
Which Penguin Classic is that?

It's The Mabinogion

 

[John1234]

It's The Mabinogion

 
Ah, that's bloody awesome sauce, they're always a good find in thrift stores. I almost picked that up once. I've got a few Penguins of Northern Euro epics/mythology, but I've only cracked them and haven't made much progress in either.

 

[Helvete]

hehe, had a black mandrake (M. autumnalis) spread wings today
 

 
Ah, that's bloody awesome sauce, they're always a good find in thrift stores. I almost picked that up once. I've got a few Penguins of Northern Euro epics/mythology, but I've only cracked them and haven't made much progress in either.

I think I've gotten quite many good Penguin Classics books from thrift stores...The Mabinogion, The Koran, The Pelyponessian War, Dante's Inferno, The Satyricon just to name a few