Vitis vinifera
Environmental Weed (2024)
Common names
grape
Biostatus
Exotic
Category
Vascular
Structural class
Lianes & Related Trailing Plants - Dicotyledons
Flower colours
Green
Detailed description
Deciduous woody liane, climbing via tendrils (usually forked). The young shoots and leaves are greyish white or pale brown, mature leaves green above, whitish or pale grey tomentose below, up to 17x18cm, and coarsely toothed. The flowers are green and fragrant, berries 0.7-1.5cm diameter, black and sweet.
Similar taxa
Grapes are very distinctive plants. Only 1 species is recognised as naturalised in New Zealand, but many plants may not be V. vinifera. True V. vinifera has tendrils in every 3rd leaf. V. labrusca has tendrils in every node. Cultivated hybrids have been referred to as V. labruscana have intermittant tendrils.
Habitat
Around old gardens and dump sites, sometimes along roadsides.
Conservation status
Not applicable
Detailed taxonomy
Family
Vitaceae
Ecology
Flowering
October, November, December
Year naturalised
1870
Origin
Mediterranean
Reason for introduction
Agricultural
Life cycle and dispersal
True V. vinifera is very susceptible to philloxera. Reproduces mainly by stem layering (Webb et al., 1988). Fruit is freely produced but most wild spread is not by seed. Many of the cultivated grapes are actually hybrids which may affect spread from seed.
Other information
Etymology
vitis: Old Latin name for vine
vinifera: From the Latin vin and fero, meaning ‘wine bearing’
Environmental Weed (2024)
This plant is named in a list of 386 environmental weeds in New Zealand 2024 prepared by DOC. 759 candidate species were considered for inclusion on this new comprehensive list of environmental weeds in New Zealand. The species considered were drawn from published lists of weed species, lists of plants that must be reported or managed by law if observed, existing national and regional programmes and agreements for pest management, and species already managed by the Department of Conservation (DOC). Candidate species were then assessed to see if they were fully naturalised and whether they have more than minor impacts in natural ecosystems. Read the full report here.
NVS code
The National Vegetation Survey (NVS) Databank is a physical archive and electronic databank containing records of over 94,000 vegetation survey plots - including data from over 19,000 permanent plots. NVS maintains a standard set of species code abbreviations that correspond to standard scientific plant names from the Ngä Tipu o Aotearoa - New Zealand Plants database.
VITVIN