Mountain Pepper - Tasmannia lanceolata (Winteraceae)

Mountain Pepper

Tasmannia lanceolata (Winteraceae)

Size: 1.5-10 m high.

Form: Bushy or erect shrub or small tree.

Habitat: understorey of open forest or temperate rainforest, on cool moist slopes and in gullies. Lower montane to subalps.

Foliage: leaves lanceolate to narrow-elliptic or oblanceolate; apex acute; alternate then clustered towards ends of smooth red branchlets, glossy (glabrous), dark-green above, paler green and glaucous beneath, 4-12 cm x 7-30 mm.

Flowers: white to creamy, clustered in terminal umbel-like inflorescences, dioecious (male and female floral parts borne on separate plants). Petals: 3-9, linear-oblong or narrowly obovate, 4-10mm long, 1.5-3.5mm wide. Male flowers: pedicels 8-25mm long; stamens 15-28; sterile carpel 1(rarely absent or 2). Female flowers: pedicels 4-12mm long; carpel 1 (or 2), sessile; ovules 9-18. Flowering: September-November.

Fruit: apocarps; darkly maroon to black, lustrous, globose, deeply furrowed berries 3-7mm in diameter. Fruiting: December-February.

Distribution: cool temperate climate zone, where annual rainfall >930mm; mountainous regions at 300-1400 m altitude; south-east Victoria (and including the Otways), Tasmania, south-east New South Wales and ACT.^(1,2,3,7)

AVH (Australian Virtual Herbarium) distribution map.

Mountain Pepper is the first plant selected to be featured, chosen for numerous reasons as you’ll come to learn. Firstly, as the common name suggests this plant has culinary and bushfood appeal. Crushing the leaves releases a sweet, spicy note to the olfactory senses, but it is not until one samples the leaf or berries that the ‘pepper’ can be truly appreciated. My first experience came after reading about a dirty joke played upon the author of Herbal Harvest, Greg Whitten.⁽⁶⁾ My curiosity in the “mouth on fire” experienced at the expense of Whitten, led me too to sample a leaf from a population of Mountain Pepper growing on the flood plains of the Acheron River, Buxton, Victoria where the rare Eucalyptus crenulata (Buxton Blue Gum) calls home. As described by Whitten, an aromatic, mildly spicy flavour initially brushes the palette, then after a short delay of maybe 10 seconds or so, the enzymes in my saliva unpacked a natural ‘Warhead’ constituent which alluded me to the reason why this plant doesn’t experience a great deal of herbivory*. Nevertheless it was not an all together unpleasant experience, like that of an appreciation for chilli.

So naturally the bushfood product sold in Australia, is marketed as a native pepper produced from drying the leaf and berries. ⁽⁷⁾ Interestingly enough, the oil extract has been imported to Japan where it has been used for flavouring in wasabi paste, candy and chewing gum. ⁽³⁾

The genus Tasmannia has total of 50 species occurring from Malesia to the eastern states of Australia with eight species endemic to Australia. ⁽³⁾

*The ‘pepper’ taste contained in the foliage and fruit is a secondary metabolite, a compound called polygodial, which has been found to be antimicrobial and an insect antifeedant. ⁽⁵⁾

In the Garden

The glossy foliage and red branchlets make this an attractive shrub in a shady part of the garden. ⁽⁸⁾ The plant responds well to pruning and is easily maintained. Soils need to be moist but well drained and mulching is highly recommended. ⁽⁴⁾ Mountain Pepper is not very well adapted to overly dry conditions being of an understorey species evolved in cool temperate forests and woodlands, so it requires regular watering, however avoid overwatering to curb the chances of root-rot infections. ⁽⁴⁾

Mountain Pepper also grows well in pots. I suggest you establish the seedling in a larger size pot to avoid re-potting later on down the track, as it doesn’t cope well with being transplanted. ⁽⁶⁾

 Pic. In my backyard in Brunswick I have this Mountain Pepper growing in a 16 inch terracotta pot, with a vigorous ground-covering of Kidney Weed (Dichondra repens), another cool-temperate Victorian native at its base. I had recently pruned it back a little and as a result, numerous new branches of fresh foliage have arisen on the charismatic red branchlets. Photo: Nick Moore.

If you’re keen to grow the plant for the pepper berries you’ll need a female plant to bear the fruit but you’ll also need a male plant in close proximity to pollinate the female flowers. This is easier said than done I’m afraid, as there’s no way to tell with juvenile plants what sex you’ve got. If you do happen to grow specimens that bear pepper berries, you are likely to attract birds into your garden and this is actually how the plant is dispersed in the wild by birds such as the Green Rosella (Platycercus caledonicus) and Black Currawong (Strepera fuliginosa).⁽⁷⁾

Native Nurseries

Here’s a list of the nurseries around the Greater Melbourne area and Tasmania that one might obtain Mountain Pepper seedlings. I got mine from Keelbundora Indigenous Plant Nursery which is affiliated with the La Trobe Wildlife Sanctuary in Bundoora and I also got one from CERES Permaculture & Bushfood Nursery in East Brunswick.

CERES Permaculture & Bushfood Nursery: Cnr. Roberts and Stewart Streets Brunswick East, Victoria 3057. Hours:  Seven days a week from 9am until 5pm Phone: 9389 0111. Email: nursery@ceres.org.au

Keelbundora Indigenous Plant Nursery: Cnr. La Trobe Ave. And Main Road, Bundoora, Victoria. Entrance off La Trobe Ave. Open: Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday from 10am to 3pm. Phone: (03) 9479 2871 OR (03) 9479 5061 Email: plants@latrobe.edu.au

Kuranga Native Nursery: 118 York Road Mount Evelyn, Victoria, 3796. Open 8.30am to 5.00pm 7 days a week Closed Good Friday & Christmas Day. Phone. 9760 8100, Fax. 9737 1968

Plants of Tasmania Nursery: 65 Hall Street, Ridgeway, Tasmania. Opening hours: 9am-5pm, seven days a week, Winter opening hours (June, July, August): 9am-5pm Monday to Friday, 9am-4pm Saturday and Sunday, closed Christmas day, Boxing day and Good Friday. Phone: (03) 6239 1583, Fax: 6239 1106. Email: plantsoftasmania@gmail.com

Redbreast Native Plant Nursery: 1709 Channel Highway, Margate TAS 7054 Open 9am-4pm 7 days/week. Phone: (03) 6267 2871, Fax:  (03)6267 1077, Email: margate@redbreast.com.au   

VINC - Victorian Indigenous Nurseries Co-operative: Yarra Bend. Fairfield, Victoria, 3078.Open 9.00am to 4.00pm Monday-Friday, Saturday & Sunday 12.00pm to 4.00pm. Phone. (03) 9482 1710, Email: vinc@vicnet.net.au

Further reading and links

Also note that the references listed below for further reading.

Australian National Botanic Gardens (ANBG): Australian Plant Name Index (APNI) - http://www.anbg.gov.au/cgi-bin/apni?taxon_id=26990

Diemen Pepper - http://www.diemenpepper.com/index.html (This site also has recipes for Mountain Pepper).

Plants of Tasmania Nursery - http://www.potn.com.au/plant_list_T.html

The Tasmanian Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment (DPIWE) - http://www.dpiw.tas.gov.au/inter.nsf/Attachments/LJEM-7CV7BN/$FILE/Tasmannia%20lanceolata%20Notesheet.pdf

Gardening Australia - http://www.abc.net.au/gardening/stories/s786406.htm

Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tasmannia_lanceolata

References

1.      Costermans, L. (1981). Native Trees and Shrubs of South-Eastern Australia. Reed New Holland, Frenchs Forest.

2.      Duigan, S.L. (1992). The Families and Genera of Victorian Plants, 14^th edn. School of Botany, University of Melbourne.

3.      Guymer, G.P. (2007). Winteraceae. Flora of Australia 2, 1-10.

4.      Hele, A. (2001). Mountain Pepper production. Primary Industries and Resources S.A.: Fact Sheet.

5.      Read, C. and Menery, R. (2000). Analysis of the contents of oil cells in Tasmannia laceolata (Poir.) A.C. Smith (Winteraceae). Annals of Botany 86: 1193-1197.

6.      Whitten, G. (1997). Herbal Harvest: Commercial Organic Production of Quality Dried Herbs, 2^nd edn. Bloomings Books, Hawthorn.

7.      Worth, J.R.P., Jordan, G.J., Marthick, J.R., McKinnon, G.E. and Vaillancourt, R.E. (2010). Chloroplast evidence for geographic stasis of the Australian bird-dispersed shrub Tasmannia lanceolata (Winteraceae). Molecular Ecology 19: 2949-2963.

8.      Wrigley, J.W. and Fagg, M. (2007). Australian Native Plants: Cultivation, Use in Landscaping and Propagation,Concise Edition. Reed New Holland, Chatswood.