Ear-leaf nightshade

Solanum mauritianum is a fast-growing small evergreen tree or large shrub of the Solanaceae family typically 4-10 m tall, with a single stout greyish trunk and a few erect branches forming a rounded crown; all young parts are densely covered in a soft greyish-yellow stellate tomentum. The leaves are alternate, large, elliptic to oblong-lanceolate, 15-30 cm long and 4-10 cm wide, with an entire to slightly sinuate margin, a long acuminate tip and a wedge-shaped base extending into a winged petiole; at the petiole base on either side stand the characteristic pair of small rounded auriculate 'ear' leaflets 1-3 cm wide that give the species its English name. Both leaf surfaces, twigs and inflorescences are densely yellow-tomentose. The inflorescences are large, terminal or leaf-opposed, much-branched corymbose panicles 8-15 cm across bearing many flowers; each flower is a five-lobed stellate pale lavender to violet corolla 1.5-2.5 cm across with a yellow central column of five connivent stamens. The fruit is a globose dull yellow berry 10-15 mm in diameter borne in dense clusters, containing many small flattened seeds in a juicy pulp; the unripe and ripe fruits and foliage are toxic. Native to subtropical South America from southern Brazil to northern Argentina.