This plant is poisonous and should not be eaten. A small shrub up to around 2.5 m, it is most often found on sandy soil in an arid environment, around sand dunes and especially near salt lakes. After rain, the plant produces small white flowers with fine purple lines in the throat. Soon after the flowers, green to black coloured berries appear.

As its name suggests, this plant was used by Aboriginal people to poison emus. The leaves were pounded and soaked in small catchments of water. When an emu came to drink at the waterhole, the narcotic in . . .