RED OSIER DOGWOOD BERRIES

RED OSIER DOGWOOD WINTER TWIG COLOR...

RED OSIER DOGWOOD FLOWERS...

...FRUIT...

...LEAVES WITHOUT TEETH OR LOBES...

...FALL LEAF COLOR...

Saturday,  9:00 AM.  72 degrees F at the ferry dock, 69 on the back porch.  The wind is variable, with very light gusts.   The sky has scattered low clouds and some haze.  The humidity is 87%, and the barometer is mostly steady, at 29.64".  The weather is unsettled, and there is a chance of an afternoon thunderstorm,

   The common red osier, or red-twigged, dogwood, Cornus stolonifera, in the Dogwood (Cornaceae)Family, is in fruit.  It's white or lead-clored berries (rarely bluish) are quite attractive and prominent but animals quickly eat them, even though they taste quite bitter to humans.  Each berry encloes a small stone.  There aren't many white berries or fruits, the only other wild white berries that I can think of are snowberry (Symphicarpus alba), which looks nothing like dogwood berries,  and doll's eyes (Actea pachypoda), which does.  The latter is poisonous and the fruit  looks quite similar, although the plant is herbaceous, so I wouldn't eat white berries unless you really are sure what they are.  
   Native Americans did use the berries of red osier as food and as medicine for colds and respiratory ailments, and the supple twigs in basketry. Red osier dogwood is native to much of the northeastern North America, its habitat usually wet areas such as stream banks and roadside ditches, but it will grow in drier areas and is much used in landscaping for its many decorative properties, but it can be intrusive under the right circumstances, as it spreads by stolons.  The variety 'Baleyi' does not spread but has good winter twig color, and is a better choice for the home landscape.

   Dogwood species are all opposite branched, except for the native pagoda dogwood, C. alternifolia.  The leaves are entire (without lobes or teeth) and have rather distinctive venation.  

   The common name "dogwood" has nothing to do with dogs, but is rather a corruption of the Old English dagge, the root for the word "dagger," as the wood is very hard and in Europe the branches of dogwood species were sharpened and used for skewers and other implements.