Viburnum molle
Credits
Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
Recommended citation
'Viburnum molle' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
Synonyms
- Viburnum demetrionis W.Deane & B.L.Robb
Other taxa in genus
- Viburnum acerifolium
- Viburnum atrocyaneum
- Viburnum betulifolium
- Viburnum × bodnantense
- Viburnum buddleifolium
- Viburnum burejaeticum
- Viburnum × burkwoodii
- Viburnum × carlcephalum
- Viburnum carlesii
- Viburnum cassinoides
- Viburnum cinnamomifolium
- Viburnum cotinifolium
- Viburnum cylindricum
- Viburnum dasyanthum
- Viburnum davidii
- Viburnum deamii
- Viburnum dentatum
- Viburnum dilatatum
- Viburnum edule
- Viburnum erosum
- Viburnum erubescens
- Viburnum farreri
- Viburnum foetidum
- Viburnum 'Fulbrook'
- Viburnum furcatum
- Viburnum × globosum
- Viburnum grandiflorum
- Viburnum harryanum
- Viburnum henryi
- Viburnum × hillieri
- Viburnum hupehense
- Viburnum japonicum
- Viburnum 'Juddii'
- Viburnum kansuense
- Viburnum lantana
- Viburnum lantanoides
- Viburnum lentago
- Viburnum lobophyllum
- Viburnum macrocephalum
- Viburnum mullaha
- Viburnum nudum
- Viburnum odoratissimum
- Viburnum 'Oneida'
- Viburnum opulus
- Viburnum orientale
- Viburnum parvifolium
- Viburnum phlebotrichum
- Viburnum plicatum
- Viburnum plicatum cultivars
- Viburnum 'Pragense'
- Viburnum propinquum
- Viburnum prunifolium
- Viburnum rafinesqueanum
- Viburnum recognitum
- Viburnum × rhytidocarpum
- Viburnum × rhytidophylloides
- Viburnum rhytidophyllum
- Viburnum rigidum
- Viburnum rufidulum
- Viburnum sargentii
- Viburnum schensianum
- Viburnum setigerum
- Viburnum sieboldii
- Viburnum suspensum
- Viburnum sympodiale
- Viburnum tinus
- Viburnum trilobum
- Viburnum utile
- Viburnum veitchii
- Viburnum wrightii
Editorial Note
The synonym given by Bean (V. demetrionis) is unplaced by POWO (12/5/2025), which also does not recognise var. affine.
A deciduous shrub of bushy habit, 6 to 12 ft high; young shoots glabrous and bright green at first, soon turning grey; older bark peeling. Leaves broadly ovate to roundish, 2 to 5 in. long, 13⁄4 to 33⁄4 in. wide, mostly heart-shaped at the base, slender-pointed, coarsely triangular toothed, the teeth twenty to thirty on each side, upper surface dark green and glabrous, paler and more or less downy beneath; stalk 1⁄2 to almost 2 in. long. Flowers white, all perfect, 1⁄4 in. across, produced in long-stalked cymes 2 to 4 in. wide. Fruits scarcely 1⁄2 in. long, oval, much compressed, blue-black.
Native of eastern-central North America, rare in gardens (the plant once grown as V. molle was a form of the V. dentatum complex). V. molle is very distinct from other American viburnums with blue-black fruits in the combination of the loose peeling bark of the older branches, the long-stalked leaves, and the presence of a pair of glandular-downy stipules on the petiole.
In var. affine (Blake) House the leaves are more or less glabrous beneath.