Scientific name: Rubus fruticosus L. aggregate
Common name: Bramble, Blackberry
Description
Habit: A spiny perennial.
Stems: Scrambling or trailing, woody, spiny, arching, sometimes rooting at tips; spines well-developed.
Leaves: Alternate, with small and narrow stipules fused with the leaf stalk, divided with 3 or 5 leaflets; lateral leaflets usually stalked.
Flowers: White or pinkish mauve, actinomorphic, hermaphrodite, flowering in the second year, solitary or in racemes or panicles; calyx 5-toothed, calyx tube very shallow; petals 5, free; stamens numerous; carpels numerous, on a conical receptacle; with hypanthium.
Fruits: A head of many 1-seeded drupes, black, shiny, not enclosed by sepals.
Habitat: Most habitats, except uninterrupted limestone pavement or blanket bog.Distribution: Common throughout most of the region, scarce only in uninterrupted limestone pavement or blanket bog.
Native status: Native
Of conservation interest: No
Notes: Very variable, difficult to classify due to apomictic, asexual method of seed production; over 80 'species' are recorded in Ireland.