Identify this wild plant at my train station?

[Mummy08m]

This is just for my interest really.

The embankment to my local train station is very green and has lots of birds etc. I like looking at the plants. I saw this interesting plant with green berries on that I've never seen before, it just looks so exotic to me, almost like a grape! Anyone know what it is?

This is in South London if that helps, not rural or anything. The berries are quite small like just over 1cm diameter

violet

That looks like bindweed to me.

One of the nightshade family I think.

It looks like black bryony - highly poisonous.

Agree!

Bryony

I think the berries thing could be cuckoo pint / lords and ladies with a load of bind weed growing over the top of it? If it is then it will go orangy red over the next few weeks.

Leaves are wrong for bindweed, I think. Much more like Bryony.

Another vote for black bryony. Interestingly it's a member of the yam family and not related to white bryony at all. The flowers smell of cinnamon.

Agree with bryony. As you're unlikely to jump off the train and eat all the berries, the poisonous aspect isn't necessarily relevant.

Not relevant to the identification - but the OP seems to have expressed an interest in learning more about the native flora in their area, so from that perspective it provides useful and interesting information - even more so if there were any thoughts of taking a cutting or planting the berries in the garden perhaps…

That's a fair point. I belong to a number of groups on social media where plant id's are sought and usually the thing people seem to express concern about are whether things are toxic. Except that most people don't tend to go around eating random plants and berries....although I do accept that it's a useful knowledge base if you're intending to go foraging.
Great that people are interested in ID'ing plants as it seems to be a skill that is rather thinly spread, ime.
Wasn't meaning to sound facetious, more practical, but it's been a long day and my brain isn't firing on all cylinders, so apologies if I sounded a bit curt.

Gosh thank you all, I genuinely was tempted to taste one so I'm glad I didn't!! They're just off the steps down to the station so very pick-able. I'll have to tell my daughter not to touch them either because she was with me when I noticed them and we do sometimes taste the blackberries. Off to Google bryony now! Thanks all!

Except that most people don't tend to go around eating random plants

I'm that kind of person though lol, I'd have been the member of the tribe who tried everything new first while you all watched to see if I got sick. Seriously though they did look very juicy! Now I know, many thanks!

Definitely black or white briony. The berries will turn a gorgeous red later in the year as the leaves wither, and look like a string of beads ❤️

I'll look out for this 😍I use this station everyday.

After googling I learn that this plant is the uk's only native yam. Who knew?!

Thanks all!

There's an App called PictureThis. You can take photos of plants, flowers etc and it identifies them for you.

I genuinely was tempted to taste one so I'm glad I didn't!! Oh goodness! Never, ever taste anything unless you are certain what it is! Some of the most dangerous plants are in the carrot family and can easily be mistaken for herbs like chervil, other poisonous plants are in the pea family, and even the friendly rose family has a tendency to produce cyanide.

But don’t panic about the Black Bryony and ask for it to be removed. Many of our plants are poisonous, even daffodil bulbs and honeysuckle berries.

And like all apps, sometimes it spectacularly misidentifies them.

Don't worry I wouldn't have actually eaten any, especially as I'm pregnant haha. And for example I would never touch a mushroom etc either. I once freaked at my mum for letting my then-1yo pick rowan berries "because she wanted to".

And dw I wouldn't ask for it to be removed, I'm so delighted by the biodiversity where I live, just a random station in zone 3 London so quite urban really! Never even heard of bryony before except as a girl's name...!

You know apple photos will identify plants and I believe Google to?

Apple photos and google will match colour patterns in a photo co colour patterns in other photos of identified plants. Often that means the plant in your photo is the same as the plant in the photo that Apple/Google has matched it to, but in a non-negligible number of cases the plant in your photo is in fact a quite different plant from the one it has been matched to. As google/apple and other plant apps are going from colour matching not from botanical characters, they can get the ids quite wrong, and there is no indication that they have done so.

@Mummy08m No offence meant! Love that you're enjoying the diversity and spotting things around you and wanting more.

I often see fungi fruiting bodies (mushroom, toadstools) kicked over by people who think they are doing a good thing by destroying a "poisonous" toadstool, hogweed cut down by people who can't tell the difference between it and Giant Hogweed, a quite different species.. people wanting the Council to remove certain plants from parks because they've heard they're poisonous.

I remember being ill in bed as a child of about 6, in the days when GPs did home visits, and my mother warning "you'd better move that vase of woody nightshade from your bedside table, you don't want him to get the wrong idea".

Ahh no I would never cut a wild plant down - plants that are poisonous to humans might well be essential to some other animal/plant! And in any case it's still a thing of beauty to look at and be enjoyed that way.

I distinctly remember one of my teachers giving my classmate a huge telling-off for poking a lichen with a stick, and telling us all how rare that particular lichen was! And becoming endangered due to acid rain or something. It was an unbelievable hot pink colour. Ever since then I've got a respect for weird plants.

I'm going to quietly Google hogweed right now too... I'm realising how deficient my education was haha I wouldn't know a hogweed from a hog...!

Giant Hogweed , Heracleum mantegazzianum, is an invasive alien which is among several plants able to cause a photosensitive rash. I think there's justification for trying to remove it in the UK. It's not illegal to grow it, but it is illegal to let it spread on to someone else's land. It is a magnificent plant.

Hogweed, Heracleum spondylium, is a UK native, which can grow to 2m high, which is why people who don't look at leaf or flower details mistake it for Giant Hogweed.

I've got a small area of photosensitive rash, acquired from a Euphorbia - each year it reappears if it gets a heavy dose of sun. Doesn't cause me any pain or itching, unlike the Giant Hogweed rash which can cause alarming blisters.