红瑞木 hong rui mu

Swida alba (Linnaeus) Opiz.

Shrubs deciduous, spreading, to 3 m tall. Bark purplish red; young branches terete, pubescent with short whitish trichomes, later glabrous, glaucous; old branches reddish, with scattered grayish white rounded lenticels; leaf scars semicircular, conspicuous. Leaf blade abaxially glaucous green, elliptic or ovate-elliptic, 5–8.5 × 1.8–5.5 cm, papery, veins (4 or)5(or 6), pubescent with short white appressed trichomes, axils of veins sometimes with a cluster of long brown trichomes, small veins conspicuous, base cuneate or broadly cuneate, margin entire or slightly revolute, apex acute. Corymbose cymes dense, ca. 3 cm wide, pubescent with soft white trichomes. Pedicel 2–6.5 mm, slender. Flowers white or yellowish white, 6–8.2 mm in diam. Calyx lobes sharply triangular, 0.1–0.2 mm, shorter than disk. Petals 3–3.8 × 1.1–1.8 mm. Stamens longer than petals; anthers yellowish. Style cylindrical, 2.1–2.5 mm; stigma disciform, broader than style. Fruit creamy white or bluish white at maturity, oblong-globose, laterally slightly compressed, ca. 8 mm, 5.5–6 mm in diam.; stones ± diamond-shaped, laterally compressed, ca. 5 × 3 mm, 3-ribbed on each side. Fl. Jun–Jul, fr. Aug–Oct.

Mixed broad-leaved and coniferous forests, mixed thickets by streams; 600–1700(–2700 m). Gansu, Hainan, Hebei, Heilongjiang, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Jilin, Liaoning, Nei Mongol, Qinghai, Shaanxi, Shandong [Korea, Mongolia, Russia; Europe].

The seeds contain 30% oil, which is used industrially. Cornus alba is commonly cultivated as an ornamental.