Common Names

American dogwood
Boxwood
Budwood
Cornelian Tree
Dogtree
False Box
Florida cornel
Florida dogwood
Flowering cornel
Flowering dogwood
Green Ozier
Virginia dogwood
Back to Top

Parts Usually Used

Inner bark, berries, twigs
Back to Top

Description of Plant(s) and Culture

Dogwood is a native American, our most showy deciduous tree, growing to 30 feet high; the bark is brown and rough, the leaves opposite, ovate, pointed, and darker green above than beneath. Latex threads appear at veins when leaves are split apart. The flowers are small and greenish-yellow but are obscured by the large, white or pink bracts so that the whole looks like a large white or pink flower. Flowers are in clusters, April-May. The fruit is a glossy, dry, scarlet berry two celled and two seeds, is inedible and very bitter; October-November.

Other varieties: Chinese dogwood (Cornus machrophylla), Chinese name Sung-yang; in Japan this tree is Celtis muku or Ehretia serrata; Jamaican dogwood (Piscidia erythrina) used medicinally for panic attacks and excessive stress; and Osier dogwood (Cornus stolonifera) used by the Native Americans, the inner bark has properties of quinine used as tea internally.
Back to Top

Where Found

Found from Maine to Florida and west to Minnesota, Kansas, and Texas.

Grows in the understorey of woods, along roadsides and in old fields
Back to Top

Medicinal Properties

Astringent, febrifuge, stimulant, tonic
Back to Top

Biochemical Information

Tannic and gallic acids, resin, gum, oil, wax, lignin, lime potash and iron
Back to Top

Legends, Myths and Stories

Widely used in the South, especially during the Civil War for malarial fevers and chronic diarrhea.

An 1830 herbal reported that the Native Americans and captive Africans in Virginia were remarkable for the whiteness of their teeth, and attributed it to the use of Dogwood chewing sticks. Once chewed for a few minutes, the tough fibers at the ends of the twigs split into a fine soft "brush". Also, the Native American tribe, the Arikaras, mixed bearberry with the dried inner bark of the red dogwood to make sacred tobacco which they smoked in a regulation red pipestone pipe.
Back to Top

Uses

Dogwood bark is best used as an ointment for ague, malaria (substitute for quinine), fever, pneumonia, colds, and similar complaints. Used for diarrhea. Externally, poulticed onto external ulcers and sores. Twigs used as chewing sticks, forerunners of the toothpick. It was sometimes used as a substitute when Peruvian bark could not be obtained.
Back to Top

Formulas or Dosages

Use only dried dogwood bark. Fresh bark upsets the stomach and bowels.

Infusion: steep 1 tbsp. bark in 1 pint water for 30 minutes and strain. Take 1/2 cup every 2-3 hours.

Tincture: take 20-40 drops in water, as needed.
Back to Top

Warning

As with hard toothbrushes, dogwood chewing sticks can cause receding gums.
Back to Top

Bibliography

• The Herb Book, by John Lust, pgs., 175-176, 570.
• The Complete Medicinal Herbal, by Penelope Ody, pgs., 162-163, 181.
• Chinese Medicinal Herbs, compiled by Li Shih-Chen, pg., 128.
• Indian Uses of Native Plants,, by Edith Van Allen Murphey, pgs., 2, 5, 10, 20, 40, 61.
• Eastern/Central Medicinal Plants, by Steven Foster and James A. Duke, Plate 44, pg., 270.
• Planetary Herbology, by Michael Tierra, C.A., N.D., O.M.D., pg., 33.
• Indian Herbalogy of North America, by Alma R. Hutchens, pgs., 111-112.
• American Folk Medicine, by Clarence Meyer, pg., 287.
• Prairie Smoke, by Melvin R. Gilmore, pg., 106.
• Webster's New World Dictionary, Third College Edition, Victoria Neufeldt, Editor in Chief, pg., 404.
• How Indians Use Wild Plants for Food, Medicine & Crafts, by Frances Densmore, pg., 295.
• An Instant Guide to Medicinal Plants, by Pamela Forey and Ruth Lindsay, pg., 89.
• The Rodale Herb Book, edited by William H. Hylton, pgs., 64, 67-68, 81, 427-428.

Back to Top