Dogwood
Cornus florida

The fleshy berries of this small tree begin to turn red weeks before the opposite, elliptic leaves, 6-10 cm (2.5-4") long, take on their fall shades of red to maroon or rarely yellow. Flowering Dogwood is a familiar understory tree of deciduous woodlands throughout most of the eastern United States.

The small size, attractive white bracts, or "flowers", and the colorful berries and leaves of Flowering Dogwood make it an important landscape plant. The hard wood from the small trunks was used in the past to make farm implements, wedges to split rails, and shuttles for spinning mills.