Dogwood

Cornus florida

American Dogwood Boxwood Cornelian Tree Dogwood Dog Tree False Box Florida Dogwood Flowering Dogwood Green Ozier Virginia Dogwood Parts used Uses Habitat and cultivation Constituents

Dogwood - a shrub or small tree growing up to 30 feet tall. The prominently veined oval leaves are pointed and dark green above and paler green or whitish and often downy below. The true flowers (March-June) are tiny and greenish white, forming a central cluster surrounded by four showy, notched, creamy white bracts that look like petals. The flowers produce red fruits.

So beloved by Virginians is the dogwood that they named it their state tree. One early native, George Washington, noted in his diary in 1785 that "a circle of dogwood" had been planted "close to the old cherry near the south garden house." Thomas Jefferson, another famous Virginian, known for his impeccable taste and appreciation of beautiful things, planted dogwood near his cherished home, Monticello.

In springtime, as the dogwood began to bloom, the beautiful creamy white petal like bracts signaled to the Indians that it was time to plant corn. The tree was a source of medicine for them, too. They simmered the bark in water and used the extract to relieve sore and aching muscles. They also made a tea of the bark to promote sweating and hence break a fever - a remedy that physicians and herbalists later adopted. During the blockade of southern ports in the Civil War, when cinchona bark, the source of quinine, was not obtainable for treating malaria, dogwood bark tea became a substitute.

Dogwood is also known for its extremely hard wood, which has been used for all kinds of objects, from shuttles for weaving to golf club heads.

PARTS USED

Fruit, bark.

USES

Once widely used to break a fever and as a substitute for quinine in treating intermittent, or recurring, fevers such as malaria, dogwood bark tea is now regarded chiefly as an appetite stimulant. There is no evidence that any of these uses are effective.

HABITAT AND CULTIVATION

A native of North America, dogwood is found from southern Ontario and Maine south to Florida and Texas, and west to Kansas.

CONSTITUENTS

Dogwood contains an iridoid glycoside (verbenalin), saponins, quinine, and tannins. Verbenalin is known to have mild effect on the involuntary nervous system, especially that governing the digestive system.