« Back to The Holly and the Ivy
Once the non-flowering juvenile form of ivy, which is familiar as a groundcover, climbs upward on a tree or a wall and establishes itself, it changes to its shrubby arboreal form, becoming sexually mature and setting umbels of greenish-yellow flowers that ripen to black fruit. This transformation also entails a change in the form of the leaves, from lobed to cordate, i.e. heart-shaped. Photograph by Barbara Bell.