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Addisonia 17 



(Plate 233) 

 VIBURNUM CASSINOIDES 



Withe-rod 



Native of the eastern and central United States 

 Family Caprifoliaceae Honeysuckle Family 



Viburnum cassinoides L. Sp. PL ed. 2. 384. 1762. 



Viburnum nudum cassinoides T. & G. Fl. N. Am. 2: 14. 1841. 



This viburnum is found in swampy situations from Newfoundland 

 to Manitoba, and in the eastern United States extends at least as 

 far south as North Carolina. It has a number of common names 

 such as Appalachian Tea, Wild Raisin, False Paraguay-tea and 

 Swamp Viburnum or Swamp Black Haw. It is not quite as attrac- 

 tive as some of the other species of Viburnum for it is usually a 

 less profuse bloomer, probably because it is so often found in shaded 

 situations. The fruit like that of other species of Viburnum is 

 eatable, but it seems to me that it takes a good imagination to get 

 much pleasure from eating the fruit of any viburnum. 



The accompanying illustration was made from a shrub growing 

 in the New York Botanical Garden, where it was planted in 1896. 



The withe-rod is a much branched shrub from two to twelve feet 

 high. The branches are gray, and the young shoots are scurfy. 

 The leaves are rather short-petioled, and the blades are ovate or 

 oblong-ovate, dull-green, thickish, obscurely pinnately veined and 

 smooth or nearly so; they are one to three inches long with crenu- 

 late-serrulate or nearly entire margins and short-pointed apex. 

 The numerous white flowers are borne in flat compound terminal 

 usually five-rayed cymes; the cymes are two to two and one half 

 inches in diameter and their peduncles are usually shorter than the 

 cymes. The corolla is spreading, about one third of an inch in 

 breadth; it is deeply five-lobed and is exceeded by the stamens. 

 The drupe at first is yellowish but it quickly becomes pinkish and 

 at maturity is bluish-black with a bloom and sweetish; it is globose 

 to ovoid, and some three to five lines in length. Each drupe 

 contains a single flattened stone, which is round or oval in outline. 



Kenneth K. Mackenzie. 



Explanation op Plate. Fig. 1. — Flowering branch. Fig. 2. — Fruiting 

 branch. Fig. 3. — Corolla, split open, with stamens. 



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