50 * GROSSULARIACEAE ¹

Matthew L Baker ²

Shrubs, evergreen (not in Tas.) or deciduous, monoecious or dioecious (not in Tas.), erect or sometimes prostrate or climbing (not in Tas.); bark often exfoliating. Leaves alternate to spirally arranged, stipulate, petiolate, usually pubescent. Inflorescences racemose, usually pendulous. Flowers actinomorphic, (4)5-merous. Hypanthium distinct and usually persistent in fruit. Sepals erect, spreading or reflexed, often petaloid. Petals free, sometimes absent (not in Tas.), usually smaller than sepals, erect or spreading. Stamens 4–5; anthers 2-locular, longitudinally dehiscent. Ovary inferior to partially superior, 1-locular; styles 2. Fruit a berry, bearing a persistent perianth. Seeds small, numerous.

A monogeneric family (see generic account for species and distributional details). Grossulariaceae are placed in the Saxifragales. Some authors treat the family as comprising the woody Saxifragales or as part of the broadly defined Saxifragaceae (see Weigend 2006 & references cited therein).

Key references: Weigend et al. (2002); Weigend (2006).

External resources: accepted names with synonymy & distribution in Australia (APC); author & publication abbreviations (IPNI); mapping (AVH, NVA); nomenclature (APNI, IPNI).

1 * RIBES

Ribes L., Sp. Pl. 1: 200 (1753).

Synonymy: Grossularia Mill., Gard. Dict. edn 4 (1754).

Description as per family.

A genus of 150–200 species; native in temperate regions of the northern hemisphere and the Andes (South America). 2 species are naturalised in Australia; 1 species is naturalised in Tasmania. Several members of the genus are cultivated for their edible fruits, including R. rubrum L. and its hybrids (Redcurrants), R. nigrum L. and its hybrids (Blackcurrants), R. uva-crispa L. and its hybrids (Gooseberries) and hybrids such as the Currant-gooseberry crosses, eg. Jostaberries (R. nigrum x R. hirtellum Michx.). Crops of Blackcurrants are grown in the Derwent Valley, mainly for blackcurrant juice. Some species are cultivated as ornamentals.

Key references: Sykes & Garnock-Jones (1988); Lingdi & Alexander (2001); Spencer (2002); Weigend (2006).

1 * Ribes sanguineum Pursh, Fl. Amer. Sept. (Pursh) 164 (1814)

Flowering Currant

Illustrations: Sykes & Garnock-Jones, Flora of New Zealand 4: 743, fig. 73c (1988); Spencer, Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia 3: 44 (2002); Phillips & Rix, The Botanical Garden 1: 225 (2002).

Shrub to 2(–3) m tall; stems brown, with a mixture of sessile, glandular trichomes and fine simple hairs; bark on older stems exfoliating in strips. Leaves, spirally arranged, aromatic, with an indumentum of fine simple hairs and sessile and stalked glandular trichomes; stipules adnate to the petiole, membranous, with hairy glandular projections; petioles up to 6(–8) cm long, partially sheathing the stem, adaxially channelled in proximal 1/4, otherwise terete; lamina orbicular to broad ovate, 5.0–9.5 cm long, 4–11.5 cm wide, shallowly (3–)5-lobed, base cordate, adaxial surface green, abaxial surface pale green with veins conspicuously raised, whitish, margin entire, slightly recurved, apex rounded to sub-acute. Inflorescences pendulous racemes, 6–12 cm long, 7–30-flowered; bracts ovate to spathulate, up to 7 mm long, pale pink to reddish with scattered glandular and simple hairs; pedicels 5–11 mm long. Hypanthium 4–7 mm long, pale pink to reddish with scattered glandular and simple hairs. Sepals 5, elliptic to narrow-obovate, 4–5 mm long with similar colour and indumentum as hypanthium. Petals 5, white to reddish, spathulate, included within the calyx, 3–4 mm long, glabrous. Stamens 5; filaments to 2.5 mm long. Styles with two stigmatic branches. Fruit purplish black with white bloom, globose, 6–10 mm diam. Flowering Aug.–Nov.; fruiting Nov.–Mar.

Tas. (TSE); native of North America (N California to British Colombia), naturalised in New Zealand, British Isles. Introduced to Tasmania as an ornamental plant and naturalised only in the suburbs of Hobart but recorded elsewhere as a plant of cultivation (e.g. Queenstown, Cygnet). The species is associated with stream banks and roadsides. Several cultivars are listed, including double and white flowered forms. It is the single pink form that is encountered as a naturalised plant.

Ribes sanguineum resembles R. uva-crispa (Gooseberry), a species that has been recorded once in Tasmania and is naturalised, to a limited extent, in New South Wales and Victoria. Details regarding the Tasmanian specimen of R. uva-crispa are not sufficient to determine if it naturalised. Ribes uva-crispa can be distinguished from R. sanguineum as the former bears several short stiff spines at the nodes. Other species of cultivated Ribes including R. nigrum (Blackcurrant) and R. rubrum (Redcurrant) could be confused with R. sanguineum. The latter has pink to reddish (occasionally white) petals as opposed to green or greenish-white petals of the other currants. Fruits of Ribes are dispersed by birds. Ribes sanguineum was first recorded in Tasmania in 1978. Fruit characteristics and phenology in the above description are taken from Sykes and Garnock-Jones (1988).

References