Common Name:
PALE DOGWOOD, SILKY DOGWOOD
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Coefficient of Conservatism:
2
Coefficient of Wetness:
-3
Wetness Index:
FACW
Physiognomy:
Nt Shrub
B. S. Walters
Wet (very rarely upland) sites: marshes, swamps (including cedar-tamarack), bogs and fens; margins of ponds, lakes, and streams and on banks of streams and rivers; often forming dense thickets at the edges of swamps and bodies of water.
Most of our specimens are C. amomum subsp. obliqua (Raf.) J. S. Wilson. Subspecies amomum has been collected in Michigan only along fence-rows and fields in Monroe Co.; it has the underside of the leaf blades not papillose and the veins with mostly rust-colored hairs. In subsp. obliqua, the lower leaf surface is usually very minutely and densely papillose [20×–30×] and the hairs along the veins are often mostly if not entirely whitish. There are also differences in leaf shape; the blades of subsp. obliqua is lance-ovate (relatively narrower and more cuneate at the base), and they are also pale beneath, whence the common name. New young shoots of C. amomum (especially the petioles and branchlets) have mostly rust-colored hairs, while in C. foemina the new shoots (and the inflorescence) are glabrous or with very sparse mostly or entirely whitish hairs. Hybrids between this species and C. foemina have been found in several counties, and are intermediate in length of calyx lobes, pubescence, fruit color, inflorescence shape, and other characters; they have mostly inviable pollen.