Deep purple and shaped like a shooting star, we’d cultivate this flower in our gardens if the rest of the plant was cooperative.  But it isn’t.

Bittersweet Nightshade (Solanum dulcamara) is a woody perennial vine that drapes itself over nearby vegetation.  The plant looks scraggly and the flowers are small.

It’s blooming now in my neighborhood in untended plots and all the places we forgot to weed.  I can’t help but notice it though, because I like the color purple.

And that makes this plant is one of my recurring topics.  See my blog about its poisonous fruit.

(photo by Chuck Tague)