Flora of New Zealand Series

night bells

Large puberulent, soft-wooded shrub to 2.5 m high. Petiole to c. 15 cm long. Lamina 5-20-(25) × 3-12 cm on adult shoots, larger on some vegetative shoots, ovate-oblong, entire, not sinuate, becoming glabrate; base often asymmetric; apex acute or mucronate. Fls pendent or inclined obliquely downwards, very fragrant at night; pedicels glabrate or glabrous. Calyx 8-12 cm long; lobes 5, subequal and not spathaceous, not splitting, acute. Corolla 27-33 cm long (excluding attenuate lobe apices 1-3 cm long), single, white; tube cylindric and scarcely widening in lower ?-1/2, otherwise funnelform. Filaments hairy in lower part; anthers 2.5-3 cm long. Fr. not seen.

K.: Raoul Id.

N. Andes 1977

In and around a small ravine near the main area of human habitation.

FL Oct-Jul.

D. suaveolens was probably introduced from Norfolk Id by the well-known settler Thomas Bell in the 19th century. On Norfolk it is also naturalised, but as on Raoul it is very localised. The name night bells was probably coined by the Bell family on Raoul. It presumably has poisonous properties similar to those of B. candida. It has been previously known as Datura suaveolens in N.Z.