Solanum aethiopicum L.

Herbs annual, ca. 70 cm tall, pubescent with stalked or sessile, 5-9-rayed stellate hairs. Stem and branches prickly; prickles 2-5 mm, 1-2 mm broad at base, straight or slightly curved. Upper leaves often unequal paired; petiole 2-7 cm; leaf blade ovate to oblong-ovate, 10-20 × 6-14 cm, with mixed simple and many-rayed hairs abaxially, stellate tomentose along veins and often with subulate prickles 3-7 mm, irregularly sinuate-parted, apex acuminate or obtuse. Inflorescences extra-axillary, few flowered, race-mose; peduncle 1-1.5 cm. Flowers 5-merous, (6-9-merous in cultivation). Pedicel 5-12 mm, with prickles 0.2-2 mm. Calyx campanulate; lobes slightly unequal, ovate to ovate-lanceolate, 5-7 × 3-4 mm. Corolla white or slightly purplish, stellate or stellate-rotate, 1.5-2.5 cm in diam.; limb ca. 6.5 mm. Filaments 0.5-1 mm, glabrous; anthers lanceolate-elliptic, 4-5 × 0.7-1 mm, emarginate at apex and base. Ovary 4-8-locular. Style 5.7-7.5 mm. Berry orange or red, 1.5-3(-5) cm in diam., often longitudinally 4-6-grooved. Seeds reniform, 2-3.5 mm in diam.

It is a subtropical plant. It can grow in arid places. It grows in the savannah. In China it grows between 400-1,800 m above sea level.

The fruit are cooked and eaten. They are also used to flavour other foods. They can be pickled. The young shoots, stripped of flowers and buds are sliced and finely cut for use in soups.

Plants are grown from seeds. Seeds are collected from fully ripe fruit. They are washed and then dried on paper. They can be stored in a dry cool container out of the sunlight. Seeds can be sown in nursery boxes and transplanted. A spacing of about 1 m is suitable. Seedlings are transplanted after 30-35 days. Plants do not need staking.