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National Parks Service warns of ‘nightmarish’ toxic plant growing across US

This plant will be the bane of your existence.

A poisonous plant called “baneberry” is prompting warnings from park rangers who are urging the public not to consume the toxic vegetation.

“Is that plant looking at me?” the National Park Service wrote on Facebook this week alongside a photo of a white baneberry plant, whose fruits resemble eyeballs.

“Actaea pachypoda, the white baneberry or doll’s-eyes, is a species of flowering plant of the family Ranunculaceae,” the agency explained.

“The plant’s most striking feature is its fruit, a 1 cm diameter white berry, whose size, shape, and black stigma scar give the species the name, ‘doll’s eyes.’”

The organization quipped: “Did it just blink?”

While birds can nosh on the ghoulish berries — unaffected “by the toxins or the creepy eyeball aesthetic” — the plant is poisonous to humans and can result in nausea, vomiting, stomach cramping and delirium. Death is rare, but possible if large quantities are consumed, and the berries pose a risk, especially to kids and pets.


Close up view of the white berries with black stigmas of a doll's-eyes or white baneberry plant
The plant blossoms in forest areas during mid- to late-summer. Maria – stock.adobe.com

“Well I have to say that if ever there was a plant I would not even touch, never mind eat, this would be it,” quipped one Facebook user.

“This plant just screams ‘Don’t Eat Me!’ Why any human would think such a grotesque thing was palatable is beyond me,” another said.

“As if the eyeballs weren’t enough, they all have reddish ‘optic nerves’ attaching them together,” grimaced someone else. “Nightmarish.”

The plant primarily grows in areas of woodland in the US, as well as in fields or on the side of the road, and typically ripens during mid- to late-summer.

The white baneberry plants have earned the vegetation the nickname of “doll’s eyes,” but baneberry can also feature bright red bulbs.

While the haunting advisory arrives just in time for spooky season, TikTok botanists have been attempting to educate the public about the fruit’s toxicity for a while.

Forager and cook Alexis Nikole has called the plant “North America’s creepiest plant.”

“They look like they are harboring a curse,” she said in a TikTok video, on which one viewer commented, “Why is it looking at me.”


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