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Menispermum Tourn. ex L.

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Credits

Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles

Recommended citation
'Menispermum' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/menispermum/). Accessed 2026-04-20.

Family

  • Menispermaceae

Common Names

  • Moonseed

Glossary

References

There are no active references in this article.

Credits

Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles

Recommended citation
'Menispermum' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/menispermum/). Accessed 2026-04-20.

Menispermum

Flowers of Menispermum canadense are numerous, inconspicuous, greenish yellow, borne on a slender, long-stalked raceme. Meise Botanic Garden (19981146–19 from Ontario), Belgium. 27 May 2011. Image Guillaume Mamdy.

Climbing, woody or semi-woody plants, with alternate, long-stalked, peltate leaves, and separate male and female flowers. Sepals six; petals six or nine; stamens nine to twenty-four. The black or purple-black fruit encloses one half-moon or crescent-shaped seed – giving the popular name. The plants spread rapidly by means of underground stems, and are easily increased by division. Cocculus is nearly allied, but has the leaf­stalk attached at the margin of the leaf, and only six stamens.

A genus of two species, one from the eastern half of North America, the other from East Asia, northwards into Siberia.

Menispermum

Menispermum dauricum has the same three- or five-lobed leaves as the American species but the bloom is different. Private garden of Olivier Colin, Villemomble, France. 7 October 2023. Image Guillaume Mamdy.

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