POISON SUMACH; POISON DOGWOOD (Rhus Vernix, Linn.). 

 Shrub to 20 feet. Slender bush or tree, with narrow, round 

 head of slender, smooth branches, pendulous, marked with 

 orange lenticles. Bark thin, pale gray, smooth or striate. 

 Wood like that of other sumachs; sap acrid, poisonous, turn- 

 ing black. Leaves 7 to 14 inches long, with slim, reddish 

 tinged petioles, and 7 to 13 leaflets, ovate-oblong, tapering, 

 3 to 4 inches long, downy and orange-colored when opening, 

 becoming dark green and shining above, pale beneath, turn- 

 ing to scarlet and orange in fall. Flowers in slender, pubes- 

 cent panicles, grouped near end of branches, in early summer, 

 yellow-green, incomplete, dioecious. Fruit, ivory-white ber- 

 ries, sometimes grayish, ^ inch long, in graceful, drooping 

 clusters, ripe in September, persistent all winter. Dist.: 

 Swampy ground, often inundated part of the year, Maine tc 

 Florida; west to Minnesota, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Ver\ 

 common, and poisonous to touch. More to be dreaded thac 

 poison ivy. 



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