#melicytus

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Melicytus dentatus

05-SEP-2025

Hannah Watts Park, Melbourne, Vic

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#2658 - Melicytus alpinus - Porcupine Shrub 

AKA Hymenanthera dentata var. alpina, and Hymenanthera alpina. Melicytus comes from the Greek for 'honey cave' and refers to the staminal nectaries of the flowers.

Another unfriendly plant growing on the moraine of the Tasman Glacier, although unlike the Bush Lawyer previously this growth form may have been evolved to protect the leaves from the harsh climate, or possibly from hungry Moa.

Melicytus alpinus can be found in both the North and South Island of New Zealand in coastal and in dry alpine areas, shrugging off cold, drought, soils that are little more than broken rock, and dry saline ground. It is most common in the South Island high country.

Favoured habitat for many of New Zealand's lizards, who eat the fruit and spread the seeds.

Aoraki/ Mt Cook, Aotearoa New Zealand

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#1926 - Melicytus ramiflorus -  Māhoe

AKA Whiteywood

A small, much-branched tree from the Violet family, growing to a height of about 10m. In open lowland and lower montane forest throughout New Zealand it is one of the most common trees. It frequently germinates as an epiphyte on tree ferns. The bark is a whitish colour and the branchlets very brittle.

Decaying Māhoe leaves form characteristic skeletonised leaves, piling up around the base of the tree.

The scented, small, yellow flowers appear in late spring, and the purple berries in late summer and are eaten by native birds such as the Kereru, Tui honeyeaters, and geckos of the genus Naultinus. They don’t seem to be edible to humans, however. Both flowers and fruit grow directly from the trunk - ramiflory. 

The Maori used the liquid from boiled leaves as an external treatment for rheumatism and scabies, but the main use of this species was in the friction method of fire lighting - a slab of the soft wood scraped with a pointed stick of harder species in order to make a flame.

There is, naturally, mythology about this, and perhaps predictably it involves Maui – the great trickster god of Polynesian tradition. One day Maui set out to learn the secret of fire, put out all the fires in his village, and volunteered to go meet with his Grandmother Mahuika the fire god whose fingernails were made of flame. He persuaded Mahuika to part with one of her fingernails, and then immediately extinguished it in a nearby river. Maui persuaded her to give him another nail, and another, and continued to put them out in the water. By the last nail, Mahuika realized what Maui was doing and in a fit of anger threw up a great flame that threatened to ignite the earth, boil the seas, and burn the forests. So Maui called on his ancestor Tāwhirimātea – god of the weather - to put out the flame. 

Mahuika collected the last few sparks and looked for somewhere to place them. The trees of rata, hīnau, kahikatea, rimu, and miro all refused, but the kaikomako and mahoe accepted. Maui saw Mahuika place the spark of fire in these trees, and returned to his village to show his family and friends how they could bring out the fire by rubbing them together.

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3.8K views · 68 reactions | Mahoe is easily identifiable by its skeleton leaves. No other tree has leaves quite like it. . Mahoe is useful t

Mahoe is easily identifiable by its skeleton leaves. No other tree has leaves quite like it. . Mahoe is useful to us as a fire tree. It can

Distinguishing features and uses of māhoe (Melicytus ramiflorus), and a glimpse of some Mahoe Leafspot in the last few seconds.

[botanicsstories]

Highlights: 4.12.07

Melicytus angustifolius

A woody member of the family Violaceae, Melicytus angustifolius has beautifully coloured berries. Partially white and partially grey, they have the appearance of the Chinese Yin and Yang symbol. To add to the illusion when picked a black eye is evident at the abscission point. Squeezing will produce a purple juice that stains the skin and release the singular black seed. This plant has grey stems on which the berries are closely held, the leaves also tightly held to the stem are mid green in colour and sparsely produced giving a depleted appearance at the shoot tips.

Heading from the Chilean area where M. angustifolia is planted, also from New Zealand is M. crassifolius growing at the south east corner of the Temperate Palm House. Much leafier than M. angustifolius, the leaves are a glossy dark green with a more rounded shape. It holds a generous crop of berries which are in the main white with a little grey coloration.

For those inspired by the genus, mention should be made of M. alpinus and its cultivar ‘Pygmaea’ both growing on the New Zealand bed in the Rock Garden. Neither carry berries and would not be attractive to anyone but the most devoted plantsman, both with a prickly topping of defoliated spines, of which ‘Pygmaea’ has the softer spines.

Highlights: 4.12.07 was originally published on Botanics Stories

[botanicsstories]

Highlights: 4.12.07

Melicytus angustifolius

A woody member of the family Violaceae, Melicytus angustifolius has beautifully coloured berries. Partially white and partially grey, they have the appearance of the Chinese Yin and Yang symbol. To add to the illusion when picked a black eye is evident at the abscission point. Squeezing will produce a purple juice that stains the skin and release the singular black seed. This plant has grey stems on which the berries are closely held, the leaves also tightly held to the stem are mid green in colour and sparsely produced giving a depleted appearance at the shoot tips.

Heading from the Chilean area where M. angustifolia is planted, also from New Zealand is M. crassifolius growing at the south east corner of the Temperate Palm House. Much leafier than M. angustifolius, the leaves are a glossy dark green with a more rounded shape. It holds a generous crop of berries which are in the main white with a little grey coloration.

For those inspired by the genus, mention should be made of M. alpinus and its cultivar ‘Pygmaea’ both growing on the New Zealand bed in the Rock Garden. Neither carry berries and would not be attractive to anyone but the most devoted plantsman, both with a prickly topping of defoliated spines, of which ‘Pygmaea’ has the softer spines.

Highlights: 4.12.07 was originally published on Botanics Stories