Key to Cornus

View taxon page for Cornus

(For a list of species in Cornus, use the above link.)

Jepson Manual glossary definitions can be seen by moving your cursor over words underlined with dots.

1. Inflorescence open, not head- or umbel-like, generally appearing with or after leaves, not subtended by bracts

2. Leaf 

blade 

Expanded portion of a leaf, petal, or other structure, generally flat but sometimes rolled, cylindric, wavy, or cupped.

generally 2–5 cm, veins 3–4 pairs ..... C. glabrata

2' Leaf blade generally 5–10 cm, veins 4–7 pairs ..... C. sericea

3. Leaf generally dense-rough-hairy abaxially; petals 3–4.5 mm; stone generally 3-ridged on faces ..... subsp. occidentalis

3' Leaf generally ± glabrous to 

strigose 

With stiff, straight, sharp, appressed hairs.

abaxially; petals 2–3 mm; stone generally smooth on faces ..... subsp. sericea

1' Inflorescence head- or umbel-like, generally appearing before leaves, subtended by 4–7 showy or ± non-showy bracts

4. Inflorescence bracts 4, ± not showy, ± brown, generally with yellow margins, ephemeral ..... C. sessilis

4' Inflorescence bracts 4–7, showy, ± white, persistent

5. Shrub, tree, not rhizomed; inflorescence bracts 4–7, 4–6 cm; fruit 10–15 mm, 

elliptic 

In the shape of a flattened circle or ellipse; wider than linear

..... C. nuttallii

5' Perennial herb, rhizomed; inflorescence bracts 4, 0.8–1.6 cm; fruit ± 8 mm, spheric ..... C. unalaschkensis

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