Rubus trifidus Thunb.

An evergreen or sub-evergreen shrub, with erect stems, 4 to 7 ft high, zigzagged towards the top, not (or but little) branched the first year, beset with glandular hairs at first, but soon becoming glabrous. Leaves dark lustrous green, usually five- or seven-lobed, 4 to 10 in. across; the lobes reach half or two-thirds of the way to the stalk, are ovate, pointed, doubly toothed, slightly hairy on the chief veins above and below; stalks 1 to 21⁄2 in. long. Flowers 1 to 11⁄4 in. wide, rosy-white, produced singly in the terminal leaf-axils and in a few-flowered, terminal corymb, each on a downy stalk 3⁄4 to 11⁄2 in. long. Calyx very downy outside. Fruits described as red and edible.

Native of Japan; introduced about 1888. This rubus is distinct from all other cultivated species in its large, handsome, deeply lobed leaves, which bear a great resemblance to those of Fatsia japonica, except that they are not so large. It is worth growing for their sake. The flowers, which appear in May are not freely borne, and I have never seen the fruit. The leaves of the flowering shoots are frequently three-lobed, and it is to them that the specific name refers.