What Is the Vine With Shiny Red Berries and Purple Star-Shaped Flowers? Identifying Bittersweet Nightshade

It sprawls up through the shrubs along the fence, tangles over a woodpile, or scrambles at the brushy edge of the yard, and by late summer it is impossible to miss: loose, drooping clusters of shiny, egg-shaped berries that ripen from green through yellow to a bright, glossy red, often hanging beside small purple flowers with backward-curled petals and a pointed cone of yellow in the middle. The flowers look like miniature tomato or potato blossoms — which is a strong clue, because that is exactly the family it belongs to. This is very likely bittersweet nightshade (Solanum dulcamara), also called climbing or woody nightshade, a common weedy vine across much of North America. It is genuinely pretty, and its bright berries are also toxic, so it is worth learning to recognize. Here is how.

What Bittersweet Nightshade Looks Like

Bittersweet nightshade is a perennial climbing or trailing vine with slender stems that are woody at the base and green and flexible toward the tips, scrambling over other plants rather than twining tightly. Its most recognizable feature is its flowers and fruit, which are often on the plant at the same time in late summer:

• Star-shaped purple flowers about a half-inch across, with five swept-back petals and a prominent central cone of fused yellow stamens — like a tiny purple shooting star or a small tomato flower
• Berries in loose, drooping clusters that ripen from green to yellow-orange to a shiny, translucent red, each oval and roughly a third to a half-inch long
• Leaves that are often distinctively shaped, with two small lobes or "ears" at the base of a larger pointed tip, giving many of them an arrowhead or three-part look
• A vining, scrambling habit — climbing fences, shrubs, and brush piles in damp, disturbed ground, hedgerows, streambanks, and neglected corners
• A faintly unpleasant smell from the crushed leaves and stems, and no thorns

Why It Deserves Respect

Bittersweet nightshade is in the nightshade family (Solanaceae) alongside tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, and the notoriously toxic deadly nightshade, and it contains solanine and related compounds that make it poisonous to people, pets, and livestock. The bright red berries are the real hazard: they are exactly the kind of glossy, candy-colored fruit that a young child or a curious dog is drawn to, and eating them can cause nausea, vomiting, stomach pain, drowsiness, a slowed heartbeat, and other symptoms. The leaves and stems are toxic as well. This article is for identification only and is not medical advice — do not eat any part of this or any wild plant you cannot positively identify as safe. If a child or pet swallows the berries, contact Poison Control or your veterinarian, and treat any serious symptoms as an emergency.

Quick field call: a scrambling vine with small purple star-shaped flowers (yellow cone in the center) and drooping clusters of shiny red, oval berries, growing over shrubs and fences in damp, weedy ground, is almost certainly bittersweet nightshade. Enjoy the look, but leave the berries alone.

Look-Alikes and How to Separate Them

Several red-berried and purple-flowered plants get confused with bittersweet nightshade, and knowing the differences keeps you from either panicking or misjudging a real hazard:

• Pokeweed: also a common poisonous plant, but a tall, thick-stemmed weed with magenta stems and dark purple (not red) berries in upright-then-drooping clusters — not a thin scrambling vine
• Deadly nightshade (belladonna): rare in North America; has solitary black (not red) cherry-sized berries and dull purplish bell-shaped flowers, not the swept-back purple stars of bittersweet
• Honeysuckle vines: bush and vine honeysuckles bear paired red or orange berries, but with tubular flowers and simple oval leaves — no purple star flowers and no yellow central cone
• Wild tomato or ground-cherry relatives: share the family look, but bittersweet’s climbing habit, purple stars, and clustered shiny red berries are distinctive

Found a pretty vine hung with shiny red berries and want to know whether it is something harmless or a plant to keep kids and pets away from? Snap a photo of the flowers, leaves, and berries and let Spotter help you identify it — so you can tell bittersweet nightshade from its look-alikes with confidence.