The New Zealand Plant Conservation Network

I have noticed this summer that least one of our many coprosma robusta plants that seem to be male nevertheless has the odd fruit attached right next to the stem. See picture attached. Almost always this involves a single fruit only, and very clearly the plant is not female (all the females are now showing the usual cluster of fruit in various stages of ripening). I imagine such things are not unknown, but curious to know about this possible hermaphroditism (if that's the correct term).

Gender expression in Coprosma is not as firmly fixed as people think. Indeed, Allan (1961, FL I) even states this. I have seen solitary Coprosma repens with male and female flowers (indeed there is an example of this loaded up on the NZPCN website), or this species with seemingly 'perfect' hermaphroditic flowers. Others have reported this in C. foetidissima, C. rubra, C. spathulata subsp. spathulata, and also, as you observe in C. robusta (which I have seen too). In Coprosma repens I have noted that in some examples the anthers of 'perfect' flowers are not functional, or on plants with both genders the 'male flowers' lack functional stamens (but not always either). All of this would be worth studying further, especially as I also believe many of our Coprosma have some degree of apomixis as well (C. robusta especially so). Peter Heenan has shown this for C. waima and knows of other examples.

Many thanks for this great explanation.

Welcome! :-)