April 2: Dogwoods

It's dogwood time. I think I started really noticing and appreciating wildflowers and the seasons when I was around twelve, and dogwoods were the first I knew well. I associate them with this month because I remember cutting blossoms to make a bouquet for a friend whose birthday was in April. They have a more solid feel than the fruit tree blossoms; they're large, the petals are almost leathery rather than being tissue-paper confetti-like, and they're creamy instead of pure white. They're so graceful though, growing wild in the understory of the forests, like horizontal drapes of crocheted lace among the fringes of green and still grey branches of the larger trees. The blossoms are distinctive with their green, knobbly center and petals that curve into almost a hole at the edges. I can understand why they've inspired religious legends.



There are some cultivated dogwoods that have light pink to dark pink blossoms. The ones on campus are quite pretty.



They're pretty all year, not just with the blooms. In summer those knobbly flower centers swell to clusters of green berries, and by fall the berries are dark red and the leaves are orange to a deep wine color. Flowering dogwood trees are Cornus florida, but there are other types of dogwood that aren't trees at all. In Kansas last year, I saw swamp dogwood.