Skip to content

Your account

With an account, your progress (modules read, XP, badges, cards, notebook, pack, challenges) follows you on every device. Without one, it stays in this browser.

or
Toxic☠️ To avoid

🍇 Bittersweet Nightshade

Solanum dulcamara · Solanaceae

🌳 Temperate Europe🍁 North America
🧠 To remember it"Tiny tomatoes in the hedge, keep them far from your plate's edge" — bright red by the river is not a snack.
Bittersweet Nightshade — Solanum dulcamara

🔍 Identify it without mistakes

Semi-woody vine climbing in damp hedges and riverbanks, with purple flowers typical of Solanaceae (reflexed petals, yellow stamens forming a cone), followed by bright oval shiny red berries in hanging clusters that remain toxic even when ripe, contrary to popular belief.

  1. purple flowers with 5 backward-pointing petals and a central yellow cone of stamens
  2. leaves often arrow-shaped or with 2 small lobes at the base
  3. bright shiny oval red berries in hanging clusters, looking like tiny elongated tomatoes
  4. climbing stem, woody at the base, scrambling through riparian bushes
Sizevine up to 2 m
FloweringMay-September, berries July-October
Habitatstream banks, damp hedges, thickets, damp waste ground

⚠️ Not to be confused with

Small garden-escaped cherry tomatoes (Solanum lycopersicum)none for the tomato

To tell them apart: bittersweet nightshade grows as a wild climbing vine on riverbanks or hedges, never as an upright garden plant; its berries are smaller and more elongated, hanging in loose clusters typical of a vine

Cranberry (Vaccinium macrocarpon)none — cranberries are edible; the risk is picking red bittersweet nightshade berries in the same bog

To tell them apart: cranberries crawl flush with sphagnum moss, with tiny leathery leaves and floating fruit; bittersweet nightshade climbs, features star-shaped purple flowers with a yellow center, and hanging red berries in clusters on an aerial stem

☠️ What kills

nomSolanine and solasodine (glycoalkaloids), present throughout the entire plant including the berries even when ripe
dose letale estimeemoderate to high toxicity depending on maturity and quantity; around thirty berries can be dangerous for a child, the precise human lethal dose is not established (approx)
delai1 to 3 h
symptomesdigestive disorders (nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain), in severe cases drowsiness, neurological issues, and heart rhythm disturbances
antidoteno specific antidote; symptomatic treatment
morts documenteesrare; mainly severe cases in children after ingesting a large quantity of berries (approx)

First steps : Call poison control if berries are ingested, especially by a child. Do not induce vomiting. Keep a sample of the berries or stem for identification, even if the berries looked ripe.

Sources (2)

No entry replaces a certain identification in the field, or medical advice. When in doubt: don't eat it. If ingestion is suspected: poison control or 112/911.