Duranta erecta L.

GOLDEN DEWDROPS

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Hiern (1877) was apparently the one to establish Duranta erecta as the accepted name and D. repens as its subsumed synonym (see Munir 1995). Sanders (2001) mentioned the possibility of it being native to south Florida and also as an escape from early cultivation. Others have treated it as native (e.g. Arnold 1937), possibly partly based on a J.K. Small specimen labeled as from a hammock in Miami-Dade Co. in 1915 (FLAS). Among early collections, there is a cultivated specimen from Columbia Co. in 1904 (FLAS). Substantiative evidence of historic or extant native populations is wanting. Sanders (2001) stated it was naturalized in Texas and California.

Not Native