Florida Forest Plants

Peppervine  (Ampelopsis arborea)

Peppervine commonly occurs on a wide variety of habitats from upland fencerows on moist sites to flooded bottomlands. Peppervine is found in most of the southeast, between Texas and Florida in the south, to Oklahoma, Illinois, and Virginia in the north.

Peppervine is a source of food for white-tailed deer. The fruits provide food for numerous other wildlife species including raccoons.

Peppervine is a slender, woody vine that climbs by forked tendrils up to forty feet high. It also can be low-growing and bush-forming without tendrils.

  

 Identifying Characteristics
Size/Form:
 Peppervine is a high-climbing vine that is occasionally bushy. It climbs by branched tendrils that occur opposite to leaves.
Leaves:
 The leaves are compound, alternate, and deciduous. They are usually 4" to 10" long and wide and broadly triangular in outline. They are bipinnately or tripinnately compound. The leaflets are 1" to 2" long and ½" to 1½" wide and oval or diamond shaped in outline with large serrate teeth or deep lobes. The upper leaf surface is green and shiny and the lower leaf surface is lighter green with hairy, raised veins.
Fruit:
 The fruit is a dry, round berry, about ¼" to ½" wide and turns green to red to black. The smooth berries occur in clusters and contain two to five seeds.
Stem:
 New stems turn from light green to reddish or purplish color and eventually to a tan color. The round stem contains a white pith and has swollen nodes that can be smooth or have rough lenticels.
Habitat:
 It most commonly occurs in moist to wet bottomland forests and along streams and rivers but can also be found in moist forest plantations and forest margins.


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Leaves and twigs


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