Coffeeberry

Frangula californica

Family: Rhamnaceae (Buckthorn)

Flowers — color: white, size: 1/4", type: 5 petals

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The tiny flowers have five white petals and a yellow-green center. Five stamens support white anthers and a green pistil. Tight clusters hold one to two dozen flower buds in umbels or cymes.

Habit:
Coffeeberry is a perennial shrub with a dense, mounding appearance, six to ten feet high. The leaves are tough and smooth, elliptical with an acute point, and attach alternately to red stems.

Flowers produce a fruit that evolves from green to red to purple then black. The fruit yield seeds that resemble coffee, hence the common name. Brave people report enjoying the juice, and roasting and brewing the seeds. The Chumash used the inner bark for a laxative tea: it treated constipation caused by their favorite acorns. Others used leaves to treat poison oak and skin infections.

Observations:

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