Family: Amygdalaceae (plums, peach, cherry, apricot)

Status:

Description:
Tall evergreen shrub or small tree 2-14m high, with smooth grey bark. Leaves are alternately arranged on the stems, 7-15 cm long, dark green and glossy above and paler green underneath. They have a stiff, leathery texture and a prominent yellow main vein which runs into a stout yellowish leaf stalk. There may be small teeth on the leaf margins near the tip, or leaf margins may be smooth and slightly rolled down. Crushed leaves give off a hydrocyanic acid (bitter almonds) smell. The fragrant flowers are produced in spring and are small (8-10mm diameter) and white with 5 petals and long stamens, in elongated clusters 5-15 cm long carried in the leaf axils. Fruits are pointed 10-12 mm long berries ripening from green to red and then purple-black.

Preferred habitat and impacts:
Sometimes found in old gardens, where it was used as a hedge or a feature plant, and still occasionally seen on sale in nurseries. Birds spread the seed and it may naturalise around towns and old farms. Generally seen in moist shady sites such as river banks. The seed can germinate in dense shade.

Both the leaves and the fruits are very poisonous. The spreading form and dense foliage casts a deep shade which can suppress native vegetation.

Dispersal:
Birds and dumped seed-bearing garden waste. Branches can form roots where they droop down to the ground, so vegetative spread can also occur.

Look-alikes:
Another uncommon introduced garden plant, Portugal laurel (Prunus lusitanica) is very similar, but the leaves are more conspicuously toothed along the full length of the margins.

A native rainforest plant, buff hazelwood (Symplocos thwaitesii) is quite similar. It too is a shrub or small tree to 15m high, with alternate thick, leathery leaves, which will make a rattling noise if the branch is shaken. The leaves are similar in size and shape to those of cherry laurel but are usually dull rather than glossy above, with a conspicuous yellowish midrib. They also are variably toothed or smooth on the margins. They tend to be clustered towards the branch tips while those of cherry laurel are more uniformly distributed along the branches. Flowers are greenish white in elongated axillary clusters like those of cherry laurel. However, the clusters may be branched near the base, which would help to distinguish this plant from cherry laurel, whose flower clusters consist of a simple main stem with flowers uniformly distributed around it on stalks about 1 cm long.

Buff hazelwood is an uncommon rainforest plant found north from about Orbost in Victoria. It is most likely to occur in relatively undisturbed sites in sheltered gullies, while cherry laurel is more likely to be found in gardens or in moist situations close to old gardens. However, because of its bird-distributed fruits and tolerance for deep shade, cherry laurel can also invade undisturbed sites far from habitation.

Control:
Mature plants will re-sprout from the base if burnt or cut down. Cut and paint. Hand-pull small plants.