The Cornelian cherry tree isn't a cherry tree

Species name: Cornus mas

Common name: Cornelian cherry

Location: Western University campus

I must admit, when I saw that this was part of the dogwood genus I was surprised...very surprised. But the more I examined the tree, the more it started to make sense. I'll explain more below. The Cornelian cherry is native to eastern Europe through parts of the Middle East (Iran, Armenia, Azerbaijan) and into parts of southwest Asia. Throughout many of these countries it is an important plant for traditional food and beverage production (more on that below), and at times even part of traditional medicine. There is no status official reported for this species, but since reports state that the products obtained from the plant are "better" from wild plants as opposed to cultivated plants, it is actively harvested in the wild. This probably contributes to a declining population, but a full evaluation on population size and reproductive ability would have to be done before any drastic conclusions could be made.

So why did it surprise me to find out this was in the dogwood genus (Cornus)? Well, I walk by this plant every day on my way into school and on my way home from school and I've always been convinced it was some kind of rose. Granted, I've never looked that closely. But it's a rose, darnit! Alas...it is not a rose. The leaves, for one, are absolutely characteristic of dogwood leaves. They are perfectly smooth on the top and bottom, as well as having "entire" margins (the margins of the leaves don't have teeth, unlike the fine, or sometimes large, teeth of members of the rose family) and very prominent main veins and secondary veins (and the tiny net-like branches of tertiary veins appearing to be completely absent at the base of the leaf). The leaves are also opposite on the stem, an important identification characteristic of the dogwood genus. The fruit also confused me; oval fruits with a pit inside them similar to a cherry pit but more almond-shaped is characteristic of the rose family, but can also happen in dogwoods (although much less common). The flowers, if I had of paid attention to them in the spring, is what would have also given them away. The tree produces bright yellow flowers (the flowers of the rose family are white, light pink or bright magenta) with only four petals instead of the rose family's five. The flowers are also produced VERY early in the spring (sometimes as early as February during mild winters, but most often the end of March), sometimes months before the first leaves start to appear. All-in-all definitely not a rose, and definitely a dogwood. The overall shape of the tree, although very difficult to discern from the first photo because of the buckthorns that are starting to re-grow (despite the massive clear-cut of buckthorn that occurred during the fall of the year before), is also characteristic of dogwoods and not roses. Without pruning, dogwoods often grow to a "triangle" shape, where the lower branches are very far-reaching and the branches above that become gradually shorter as the tree gets taller, so the canopy makes a cone-like shape. Rose family trees on the other hand are much rounder in shape, and all of the branches tend to reach upwards instead of outwards. Tree shape, if you can actually see the entire tree, is often a great characteristic to use to identify individual trees, but beware of pruning which can drastically alter the natural shape of the tree.

I eluded to some of the uses of this tree above, and I would be interested in trying some of the traditional beverages produced by this plant. After reading that the fruit was edible, I went back and tried one. Let me tell you: ripeness is everything for this plant. Oh, goodness. The fruits of this plant are somewhat unusual in that they only fully ripen after falling off the tree. I figured I could get close enough by finding a really red fruit on the tree and giving it a chew, but it was one of the most unpleasant experiences of my life. IT IS SO SOUR!!! I thought my cheeks were about to explode. Since I figured I had put my body through enough trauma I should just find a clean-ish fruit off the ground and give it a try. And you know what? Still sour. But not unpleasantly sour. Just not something you'd eat a bucket-full every day. Definitely not something I'd do again...I try to make a habit of not eating things off the ground. So, the berries are sort of edible but not very pleasant. What to do with them? Well, if you've ever walked under a Cornelian cherry tree about this time of year, you've noticed the smell: sickeningly sweet, and rotting fruit. Do you know what sickeningly sweet, rotting fruit is good for? Making alcohol. The starches in the fruit are already starting to break down by natural microbial action (which is why the fruit go from smelling like nothing to smelling like pure sugar in a matter of a few days), so if some brewer's yeast were to be added then you would get quite a potent alcohol produced. This idea has been exploited in almost every single country that this tree is native to; in Azerbaijan and Armenia the fruit are used to produce vodka, in Albania an alcoholic "moonshine" like beverage called raki is produced, and in Greece a liqueur is produced where the berries are fermented, then more are added back into the fermented liquid to impart flavour. Vodka doesn't usually have much flavour, but that's partly because of what you start with: corn, sorghum, wheat and potatoes don't have much flavour. Starting with a fruit that packs quite a punch I would think would give the vodka a truly unique flavour; I would definitely want to give it a taste-test compared to some "regular" vodka. I'm not so sure I'd be keen on raki, since I'm not a big fan of homemade hard liquor (I've tried chicha once, which is a South American version of moonshine made out of corn. The first few sips were OK, but very quickly became too much to handle for me flavour-wise, texture-wise, and the strength of the alcohol content). The Greek liqueur also sounds pretty tasty, so now I have a new thing to add to my list of "things to eat and drink in Greece" if I ever manage to make it there on vacation. Instead of fermenting the fruit, in Turkey and in Iran the fruits are pitted, dried and salted for a Craisin-like snack, which also sounds pretty good (it would be like a salty-sour raisin). In Turkey the fruits are also boiled with water and sugar to produce a thick syrup which is consumed with sparkling water as a beverage called a "Sharbat", and when poured over shaved ice you can see how we might get the English word: sherbert (or sorbet in France or sorbetto in Italy).

The fruit of the Cornelian cherry aren't just used as a food item or as a means of producing beverages; they're also used medicinally. The fruits themselves are exceedingly high in Vitamin C (only 3-4 berries would be enough to satisfy your daily requirement of Vitamin C intake) and so are often used as a means of warding off cold and flu in eastern Europe. Once the plant made it to China in the 1500s, the Chinese quickly started using the fruit of this plant in Traditional Chinese Medicine to restore kidney function, and to retain the body's essence. I'm not entirely sure what that involves, but if it involves the prevention of catching a cold (which involves sneezing a lot, an action often viewed as the "expulsion of the soul" which is why in English we say "bless you" afterwards) it's probably pretty effective. The wood has also been used as an important material in the construction of hunting tools, sporting equipment, machine parts, and the handles of woodworking tools. The wood is extremely dense, and actually sinks in water (which is incredibly unusual for wood). This makes it extremely durable, resistant to decay, and much stronger than other types of wood. The bark is also unusual; while it looks like "regular" bark, when it is boiled it gives off a bright red dye which was traditionally used to make the Fez hat. All that from a single plant!

False Birds of Paradise

Species name: Heliconia latispatha

Common name: expanded lobster claw, false bird of paradise

Location: Dominican Republic

The false bird of paradise is not native to southwestern Ontario, but it is native to where I photographed it; it is native to Central and South America, extending from northern Argentina up to the southern tip of Mexico. It is still quite common in some areas, but since it prefers moist, temperate forests in which to grow since intense heat can damage the flowers and the leaves. These forests, the same ones in which coffee thrives (which you can read all about HERE), are at serious risk of deforestation due to their rich soil that is ideal for use in agriculture, and also due to climate change. As the earth warms, these forests are turning into dry temperate forests since rainfall in these areas is decreasing. The false bird of paradise has been transported to many other areas of the world where it thrives in the wild and in cultivation, the most popular of the two being the South Pacific islands (Fiji, Cook Islands, Vanuatu, etc.) and Hawaii. There is actually no above-ground stem that exists in this plant. What looks like a stem is called a pseudostem; it is merely a bundle of petioles all packed in together. The true stem of the plant is a rhizome which can be found underground.

These plants are actually quite closely related to the traveller's palm (which you can read all about HERE), and there's one way that you can tell: the colour of the seeds. If these flowers were producing fruit and seeds, you would see that the seeds were bright blue (but don't have the same surface hairs like the traveller's palm seeds do). These seeds were sometimes used to create a type of "war face paint" when crushed. The colour doesn't last long, so it has limited use as a natural plant dye. It could just be that it requires a very specific type of mordant (a substance that adheres a dye to a fabric) that hasn't been tried yet.

I read on a website about the plants of Hawaii that this plant is similar to day lilies in North America; the variation in flower colour due to hybridization and selective breeding is enormous (within the species, let alone in the entire genus of Heliconia; there are about 60 species in the genus and all of their flowers are wildly different). There are some gardens in Central and South America and in Hawaii that only have Heliconia flowers planted; you would never guess that they were all closely related unless someone told you! These flowers aren't just grown ornamentally outdoors; there is also a huge market for greenhouse-grown disease-free flowers since they are so remarkable looking and are popular in flower arrangements. The flowers themselves are extremely long-lived, and can last up to a month in a flower bouquet!

A plant needing protecting

Species name: Strobilanthes dyerianus

Common name: Persian strobilanthes, persian shield

Location: UWO Greenhouse

This species of plant, with a rather uninformative common name (it's always nice when a Latin name becomes a common name, but is rather uninformative when it comes to conveying to the public what a plant looks like), is native to Myanmar (Burma). There has been very little recently undertaken ecological surveys of Burma (the most recent was by the Smithsonian in 2003) because of government hostility, but there are a few things we do know about the forest cover of the country: it's decreasing at a dramatic rate. Up until about 1995, the tropical rain forest of Burma was pristine and almost completely untouched. The mangrove forests along the coastline were intact around the coast of the entire country (which is quite large), and the dry, arid deserts were completely preserved. Then, something happened. There was a forestry law introduced to the legislature that allowed for intense logging for export (and to use within the country), and now only about 49% of the forest cover remains. Due to various reasons (major natural disasters like typhoons and tsunamis, along with deforestation), almost all of the mangrove forests along the coast are gone. The only place that they remain intact is near the border of Vietnam, and only because to Vietnam that's a nationally protected area. Due to rice and opium production (Burma is the second largest exporter of opium around the world, next to Afghanistan; this is for the legal and illegal trade), the majority of arable land on hillsides has been deforested and converted to agriculture space. In the Dry Zone in central Burma, the land has been almost completely cleared for agriculture (which has failed for almost every crop attempted). Where large tropical fauna once roamed (rhinos, buffalo, tigers, leopards, and elephants) they are now rarely found or only found in captivity (elephants are used in agriculture and as circus performers). It's a disaster of epic proportions, and not just for the flora of the country. One has to assume now that the native flora of Burma is on its way to endangerment.

The leaves on this plant are absolutely magnificent. They are the most unique shade of purple for a plant species, and not just on the top of the leaves. The entire bottom surface is full of anthocyanins, which give the leaves their purple colour (same chemicals responsible for the purple-red colour of beets). For the sheer attention it grabs, this plant has become an incredibly popular ornamental plant in recent years. If it ever reaches flowering (it can be grown in a container in more northern climates as an annual plant, or overwintered indoors), the flowers are white but don't have much of a scent. I didn't realize it at the time, but I bought one of these plants at a local grocery story nursery when I was an undergrad, and successfully killed it in a few short months (I had a lot to learn about gardening and taking care of plants when I was twenty...). At first it was a very vigorous grower, but then it just kind of petered out before keeling over and turning brown and crunchy. I named all of my plants, and this one was Sven. And now I even know why he died! These plants are incredibly sensitive to chlorinated water. When I was watering poor Sven, I was using regular tap water, which in my residence building tasted like it had been freshly drained from the Campus Recreation pool. Whoops! To those of you with backyard pools, you might want to consider different container or landscape plants if you have visitors that are good at canon balls. And if you have this as an indoor plant, use filtered water if you know your tap water has a lot of chlorine in it.

Other than the obvious ornamental value, this plant has no known other uses. I can imagine it would be a great plant to use as a dye since the leaves are so purple, but I'm not sure it has ever been used for this purpose.

Bloodroot: a native North American wildflower

UPDATE: Mi compadre (aka my friend) Aaron alerted me to a very interesting experimental application of this plant in controlling another plant I blogged about, garlic mustard (see, even I'm learning things while writing this blog!). When bloodroot rhizomes are over-planted very densely where garlic mustard is prevalent (especially in shady areas) it can out-compete it for resources, and gradually it starts to die off. A fantastic idea of using native plant species in environments where they naturally thrive to eradicate invasive weeds. Brilliant!

Species name: Sanguinaria canadensis

Common name: Bloodroot, bloodwort, red puccoon root, pauson

Location: Ontario

Bloodroot is a species of native North American wildflower that grows from Nova Scotia to Ontario, and further south in the United States down to Florida and Mississippi. It flowers usually from March to May when the ground is still quite cold, and can grow in a wide variety of soil types (but preferring sandy soils, as in the first photo).

This plant was originally used in Native American medicine as a treatment for breathing problems and as an emetic. The roots were cut into small pieces, and then steeped in hot water like to make tea. The tea would then be consumed. I wouldn't recommend that today, since we now know that bloodroot is a poisonous plant, and topical application can lead to intense pain and scarring. The dark side of this plant's "medicinal" use today is as on of the USA's "187 cancer 'cures' consumers should avoid". It seems like if a plant produces any kind of effect on the body, someone will try to pass it off as a cure for cancer. For bloodroot's case, the roots have been made into a paste and sold as a cure for skin cancer and breast cancer, leading to massive deformation and pain in both circumstances. The lesson to be learned here is that just because it's "natural" doesn't mean it's good for you!

Today, this plant is still used for its roots, but not in a medicinal sense. The roots really are red, and really do "bleed" like you would expect from its name. This is of great use as a natural red dye for fabrics and plastics or as a paint (but again should not be added to food products because of the danger it poses).

The reproduction of this plant and the way that it relies on animals is one of the most fascinating in the plant kingdom. The fleshy surrounding of the fruit attracts ants, which carry away the seeds into their underground colonies. The ants will feed on the fruit, leaving the seed intact because it has a very tough and thick seed coat. The ants probably feel it's not worth the effort to try to break through the seed coat. Once ants are done with the fruit, they carry the seeds into their "waste rooms" in their colonies to discard of them. This puts the seeds in a nutrient-rich environment, where they will stay until the next spring. They grow out of the soil, and start their life anew. This type of symbiosis with ants for seed dispersal is called myrmecochory.

Despite this incredibly complex association with ants, most of the bloodroot plants you see in one area are not grown from seed. These plants also produce an underground storage tissue called a rhizome (think of ginger; that's a rhizome) from which a new sprout can form and emerge above-ground. Every year the sugars the plant produces in the leaves are shuttled down to the rhizome where they are converted into starch and stored for the next year's growth. Every "patch" of bloodroot in an area are produced from this underground rhizome network, not from seeds. Since the plant is then no longer relying on external inputs for growth (instead breaking that starch back down into sugar and using that to grow), they can grow much earlier in the season than other plants around it.