Friday 7 August 2009

Oh No! There Is A Datura stramonium Growing In My Garden!

or more commonly known as 'Devil's Snare',

the question is how did this highly poisonous member of the Deadly Nightshade family, get there? it has a poison that causes dry mouth, blurred vision, heart irregularities, hallucinations, and eventually coma and death in severe cases, the plant is a native of the Amazon, Phyllis Abbott, 79, first noticed strange looking shoots sprouting in the flowerbed of her Suffolk garden last Spring, She and husband George, 84, contacted the Royal Horticultural Society and were shocked to discover the plant was highly poisonous, also it's leaves give off a pungent nauseating odour and the flowers smell sweet, but both are narcotic and can induce hallucinations or stupor if breathed in for too long,

it is thought to have been left in the garden from bird droppings, though for the life of me I can not think of a bird that commutes between the Amazon and the UK, another alien invader!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hello

I've just found one of them growing in our field in south-west France. It's a long way from the Amazon, too! Very pretty plant, though.