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Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
Recommended citation
'Rhamnus frangula' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
A deciduous shrub or a small tree up to 15 or 18 ft high; young shoots downy. Leaves oval or obovate, 1 to 3 in. long, scarcely half as wide; wedge-shaped or rounded at the base, often with a short abrupt point, not toothed; dark glossy green and glabrous above, paler and often somewhat downy beneath; veins parallel, usually in eight or nine pairs; stalk 1⁄4 to 1⁄2 in. long. Flowers clustered two to ten together in the leaf-axils of the young shoots, bisexual, the parts in fives; calyx and flower-stalk glabrous. Fruits at first changing from green to red, then to dark purple, 1⁄4 in. across, roundish, two-seeded.
R. frangula is widely distributed in western Eurasia and is a native of Britain, though absent from Scotland and the north-west. It is a rather handsome small fruiting tree with foliage of a cheerful green. Under the name of “dogwood” its wood is used (as charcoal) in the manufacture of the finest gunpowders. The bark has purgative properties.
A remarkable form with leaves as long as in the type, but only from {1/12} to {1/6} in. wide as a rule.
Synonyms
Frangula azorica Tutin