Dogwood Fact Sheet

Young dogwoods have bright red stems in the fall winter and early spring which turn reddish brown in the summer.

Dogwood fact sheet.

The deeply ridged and broken bark resembles alligator hide. The growth habit is upright rounded but where stems are in contact with the ground roots are formed. This behavior creates thickets. Dogwood can be found in the evergreen forests or on the edges of deciduous forests.

Its leaves are opposite taper pointed and oval. It grows on fertile loamy soil in areas that provide enough moisture and shade. Dogwood canker discula destructiva is a fungal disease that causes leaf and twig blights and trunk cankers. Its flowers which bloom in june or july are white and loosely clustered and its white fruit which appears in september and october is set off by bright red fruit stalks.

The leaves are opposite one another and from 3 to 6 inches long. This disease can kill flowering dogwood but fortunately it seems to occur at higher elevations than in south carolina. If carefully treated a mature dogwood tree species such as the flowering dogwood may reach 40 feet in height. Cornus floridal flowering dogwood is a small bushy tree which rarely attains a height of more than 40 feet or a diameter of 12 to 18 inches.

The tree displays medium growth averaging between 13 and 24 inches annually. Silky dogwood is a large shrub often 6 10 feet in height. Dogwood is a type of flowering tree that belongs to the family cornaceae.