Ligustrum sinense Lour.
Chinese privet
Shrub or small tree to c. 5 m high, evergreen, or semi-deciduous in cold districts. Shoots densely hairy. Petioles to 5 mm long, hairy. Lamina 2.5-6-(7) × 1.25-2.5-(3.5) cm, elliptic or elliptic-oblong, dull green above, hairy on midrib beneath and usually above in lower part, ciliolate when young; base broad-cuneate; apex usually obtuse. Panicles to c. 10 cm long, rather loose; branches densely hairy, somewhat flattened, ± angular; pedicels short. Bracts and bracteoles linear to oblong, caducous. Fls very fragrant. Calyx 1-2 mm long, glabrous or nearly so; lobes very shallow. Corolla white; tube 1.5-2 mm long, slightly > calyx; lobes c. 3-(3.5) mm long, elliptic-ovate, spreading, subacute. Stamens = or slightly < corolla lobes; anthers pinkish mauve or purple. Style exserted. Fr. 4-6 mm diam., globose or subglobose, dull black or purplish black. Seed 3-4 mm long, oblong, shallowly grooved.
N.: abundantly naturalised in many places from the Bay of Plenty northwards, also wild but uncommon S. to Wellington; S.: Nelson.
China 1950
Forest margins, waste places, particularly roadsides and cliffs in and near towns and cities.
FL Jul-Mar.
Poisonous (Connor 1977).
A fl. of Chinese privet is illustrated in Fig. 92. This sp. is very commonly used to form garden hedges in warmer parts, particularly in coastal areas. N.Z. plants have almost, or quite, glabrous calyces in contrast to some descriptions of this sp. from elsewhere; the mauve to purple anthers are also not present in some forms of the sp., but in N.Z., this character distinguishes L. sinense from all other spp.
