Red osier dogwood
Cornus sericea
Also called Red willow, Redstem dogwood
- Cree
- mih-kwáh-pe-mah-kwah-tik
Know another name for this plant, or a different spelling? Tell us.
The bright red stems along every creek and river bottom in this country. The inner bark is scraped, dried and blended into smoking mixtures, and the straight stems are used for making things.
Speak with someone who knows this plant before you harvest it.
Take care
- The white berries are not a food. Leave them for the birds.
What it is confused with
Easily confusedWillows Salix species
Despite the common name "red willow", this is not a willow. Willow leaves alternate up the stem; dogwood leaves sit in opposite pairs. The stretching vein threads settle it.
How to know it
- Stems
- Smooth and vivid red, brightest in winter and early spring against the snow. Nothing else on a riverbank looks like this in February.
- Leaves
- Opposite pairs, oval with a pointed tip, with veins that curve forward and run parallel toward the tip rather than out to the edge.
- Veins
- Tear a leaf gently across and the veins stretch into fine white threads before they break. This is the dogwood family test.
- Berries
- White or faintly blue-white berries in flat clusters on reddish stalks, in late summer.
The country it grows in
- Riverbanks and willow flats
- Sloughs and wet meadows
- Aspen parkland
Landscape types only. We do not publish where a patch is, and we are not going to.
When it is ready
- Bark October to MarchInner bark is taken in the cold months when the stems are reddest and the sap is down.
- Stems October to March
Right now it is July. Nothing on this plant is in season.
What it is used for
- Smudge and ceremony
- Tools and materials
Scraped inner bark, dried and toasted, is the classic partner to bearberry leaf in smoking mixtures across this territory.
Straight stems are used for frames, stakes and hoops.
How it is prepared
- Dried and stored
The outer red skin is scraped away, the pale inner bark is peeled off in strips, then dried and lightly toasted.
Protocol
Ask the plant first, and offer something before you take anything. Tobacco is what is most often offered here. Say who you are, and say what the medicine is for.
Harvest the mature plants and leave the small ones to grow. Never take the first plant you find, and never take all of them.
Take only what you will actually use. Medicine picked and then left to rot in a bag was taken for nothing.
Leave the ground as you found it. Put back any dirt you dug up, and return any plant material you do not use to the earth.
Do not gather beside roads, highways or trails, where the plants take up whatever has been sprayed or spilled there.
If you are not certain what a plant is, do not pick it and do not put it in your mouth. Ask someone. Being wrong in the field is how people get hurt.
Cut whole stems at the base rather than stripping bark from a standing living stem. A cut stool sends up new red shoots; a ringed stem dies.
Take a few stems from across a thicket, never a whole clump.