Scopolia

Scopolia carniolica is a perennial herbaceous plant of the nightshade family growing from a thick, fleshy, horizontal rhizome. It reaches roughly 30 to 60 centimetres in height, with erect, branching stems bearing soft, ovate to elliptic leaves that taper at the base. The flowers are solitary and nodding on slender stalks arising from the leaf axils, with a bell-shaped corolla that is dull brownish-purple to violet on the outside and yellowish to greenish within. Flowering occurs in early spring, soon after the plant emerges. The fruit is a rounded capsule enclosed by the persistent calyx, opening by a lid to release numerous seeds. Native to the woodlands and shaded mountain slopes of central and southeastern Europe, it favours rich, moist, humus-laden soils in beech and mixed deciduous forest. All parts contain tropane alkaloids and the plant is intensely poisonous.