Cornelian cherry dogwood offers some of the earliest spring flowers, vibrantly colored summer fruits, and exfoliating bark that adds rich visual interest to winter gardens. It is available both as a single- or multi-stemmed plant and can be a nice specimen tree if its lower branches are pruned. Small yellow flowers appear in March, and during a cool spring, they'll last for weeks. Bright red fruit that ripens in midsummer is edible but extremely tart. Fall color can be reddish to purple, depending on the year. The gray-brown to rich-brown exfoliating, flaky bark, is very attractive. The cornelian cherry dogwood is the first dogwood to flower and is one of the first plants to flower in the Midwest in early spring.

Members of the genus Cornus, commonly known as dogwoods, are welcome in the home garden for their multi-season interest -- be it flowers, fruit, foliage, and/or bark -- and their range of forms from small trees to suckering shrubs. The dominant display, however, varies among the species.

Dogwoods are native to cooler temperate areas of North America and Asia. The genus includes 45-60 species, divided into subgenera about which taxonomists disagree. The Chicago Botanic Garden's collection includes almost 100 varieties of dogwood from 20 species (7 of which are native) and over 2,400 plants.