Pale dogwood

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Pale dogwood leaf

Pale dogwood bud

Pale dogwood

Pale dogwood flowers

Pale dogwood fruit

Pale dogwood

Pale dogwood twig

Pale dogwood habit

Pale dogwood fruit

Pale dogwood leaves

Morphology

Trunk

Stems ascending to erect; bark greenish tan to reddish brown, initially smooth, eventually shallowly fissured; wood white, hard.

Twigs

Green to red, becoming grayish red to grayish brown, flexible, smooth to slightly furrowed, hairy or glabrate; leaf scars crescent-shaped; buds grayish brown, ovoid, .1 to .2 inch, apex obtuse to acute, scales hairy.

Leaves

Deciduous, opposite, simple; petiole .2 to 1.2 inch, pubescent; blade 2.4 to 3.6 inches long, .8 to 1.4 inches wide, lanceolate to ovate or elliptic, base wedge-shaped, margins entire, apex acuminate, lower surface pale green, pubescent, upper surface dark yellowish green to dark green, glabrous or sparsely pubescent, lateral veins of 3-5 pairs, more or less evenly distributed along midrib.

Flowers

Inflorescences terminal on new growth, cymes, convex to flat-topped, 50-100-flowered, 1 to 3.2 inches wide; subtending bracts numerous, minute, not petal-like; peduncles .8 to 2.4 inches; pedicels .2 to .28 inch, pubescent. Flowers bisexual, radially symmetric; hypanthium ovoid; sepals 4, connate proximally, calyx lobes greenish yellow, lanceolate to ovate, .04 to .09 inch; petals 4, inserted on nectar disk margin, lobes cream-colored, narrowly ovate to oblong, .12 to .19 inch, stamens 4, .16 to .28 inch; style 1, .08 to .16 inch.

Fruit

August-September; drupes, dark blue, spherical, .28 to .43 inch diam., sparsely pubescent; stone 1, greenish white to light brown, nearly spherical to egg-shaped, .24 to .28 inch long, .2 inch wide, with 6-9 irregular longitudinal grooves.

Ecology

Habitat

Floodplain woods, mesic upland woodlands, stream banks, marshes, prairie swales.

Distribution

East 1/3 of Kansas