The open plant encyclopedia
Snap a photo or search by any name to see how to care for it, where it comes from, whether it's safe, and a 3D model you can turn.
The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.
Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.
Cornus kousa
Also called Chinese dogwood, Japanese Dogwood, Kousa, Korean Dogwood, Snow Tower
Kousa dogwood (Cornus kousa) is a small deciduous tree from East Asia, grown mainly for its showy white spring bracts, red autumn foliage and edible red berries. It is a species, not a genus; the key to growing it is a sheltered, well-drained spot with enough moisture and acidic soil.
Cornus kousa is a small deciduous tree in the flowering plant family Cornaceae. Common names include kousa, kousa dogwood, Chinese dogwood, Korean dogwood, and Japanese dogwood.
The tree grows up to 10 metres (33 feet) tall. Whitish bracts appear in spring, along with cymes of yellowish flowers. The fruit is a red berry about 2 cm (3⁄4 in) wide.
Hybrids between C. kousa and C. florida (Cornus × rutgersensis Mattera, T. Molnar, & Struwe) and C. kousa and C. florida (Cornus × elwinortonii Mattera, T. Molnar, & Struwe) have been created by Rutgers University. Several selected for their disease resistance and good flower appearance have been named, patented, and released.
Cultivars include:
It is a plant native to East Asia including Korea, China, and Japan. Widely cultivated as an ornamental, it is naturalized in the state of New York.
The berry pulp is edible, with a similar flavour to a ripe persimmon. The rind of the berries is edible but usually discarded because it is tough with a bitter taste.
Red-Barked Dogwood · Alternateleaf dogwood · Canadian Bunchberry · Bentham's cornel · Giant dogwood · Flowering dogwood · Cornelian-cherry · Pacific dogwood · Asiatic dogwood · Bloodtwig dogwood · Redosier dogwood · Western cordilleran bunchberry
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Cornus kousa by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
