Species
+

Cornus florida L.

American Boxwood, American-boxwood, Arrowwood, Dogwood

Climate known 61 photographs
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Cornus florida, the flowering dogwood or American dogwood, is a species of flowering tree in the family Cornaceae native to eastern North America and northern Mexico. An endemic population once spanned from southernmost coastal Maine south to northern Florida and west to the Mississippi River. The tree is commonly planted as an ornamental in residential and public areas because of its showy bracts and interesting bark structure.

Text from Wikipedia, “Cornus florida”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Cornus

Cornus is a genus of about 30–60 species of woody plants in the family Cornaceae, commonly known as dogwoods or cornels, which can generally be distinguished by their blossoms, berries, and distinctive bark. Most are deciduous trees or shrubs, but a few species are nearly herbaceous perennial subshrubs, and some species are evergreen. Several species have small heads of inconspicuous flowers surrounded by an involucre of large, typically white petal-like bracts, while others have more open clusters of petal-bearing flowers. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Cornus”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Cornaceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Ontario, Illinois, Kansas +32
Wild records
1937 in range· 549 open

At a glance

Warmest month
30°C
Jul, mean day; nights 21 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1185mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jul 115 mm (CHELSA)
Light
13–40DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (March to September and December in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 1185 mm a year, wettest July at 115 mm, driest February at 81 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 13 to 40 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -11.8 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Benthamia florida (L.) Nakai; Benthamidia florida (L.) Spach; Benthamidia florida f. pendula (Dippel) H.Hara; Benthamidia florida f. pluribracteata (Rehder) H.Hara; Benthamidia florida f. rubra (Weston) H.Hara and 27 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (March to September and December in the northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads no season: 70% of the year's rain (834 mm of 1185 mm) takes 8 months, March to September and December. Mean temperature moves 23.8 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: September to March and June.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 1185 mm a year, wettest July at 115 mm, driest February at 81 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1185 mm a year at the habitat, 834 mm of it March to September and December. Wettest month July at 115 mm, driest February at 81 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 1033 mm to 1430 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 13 to 40 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 13 to 40 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 10, the highest 90th-percentile month 41).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor -11.8 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -11.8 °C, the absolute minimum -25.6 °C, about 93 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 35.8 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -2.6 °C in January (across the envelope cells -6.8 °C to 2.8 °C), warmest day 29.7 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -11.8 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 56 to 60% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 6 °C in Jan to 30 °C in Jul; mean night from -3 °C in Jan to 21 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1185 mm of rain a year, most in Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 1441 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -25.6 °C and the 99th-percentile day 35.8 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-40°-20°20°40°frost35.8° 99th-percentile day (undated)-25.6° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125150mm rainDLI 13–40RH 56–60 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 1441 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C6 / 1–128 / 3–1413 / 8–1919 / 14–2323 / 20–2728 / 24–3130 / 27–3229 / 26–3225 / 22–2919 / 16–2313 / 10–187 / 3–13
Night °C-3 / -7–3-1 / -6–53 / -2–88 / 4–1213 / 10–1718 / 15–2121 / 18–2320 / 17–2316 / 13–1910 / 7–145 / 2–9-0 / -4–4
Rain mm85 / 65–12381 / 61–132104 / 79–132100 / 83–121109 / 92–139109 / 96–129115 / 97–137101 / 83–125101 / 84–11992 / 75–11693 / 78–12195 / 75–131
DLI15 / 12–1720 / 18–2227 / 25–2934 / 32–3637 / 36–3940 / 39–4138 / 38–4134 / 33–3729 / 27–3122 / 19–2515 / 12–1913 / 10–15
RH %58 / 56–6157 / 55–5956 / 55–5856 / 54–5758 / 56–6059 / 57–6159 / 57–6260 / 58–6259 / 57–6158 / 57–5958 / 57–6059 / 57–61

Each figure is the median across the 1441 grid cells holding the 1830 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 1021:2058 (38.925, -77.075). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -25.6 °C, 1st-percentile night -11.8 °C, 99th-percentile day 35.8 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 1441 distinct grid cells holding the 1830 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1021:2058 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 39.00_-76.875, lapse-corrected -7 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 64 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeOntario, Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., Vermont, West Virginia, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, District of Columbia, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Gulf
Kew's description“shrub or tree” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker40.691, -73.993 · in the densest population, 1321 records (68% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1937 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 549 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 284 km away. 6 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 107 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 4° block of the 1937 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Cornus floridaCornus floridaCornus floridaCornus floridaCornus floridaCornus floridaCornus floridaCornus florida

Photographs: (c) Dominic, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); no rights reserved · CC0 (4); (c) Laura Clark, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Photographs: iNaturalist and Wikimedia Commons did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Cornus florida, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

The Influence of Light and Nutrients on Foliar Phenolics and Insect Herbivory
Jan Frederic Dudt, Donald J. Shure (1994) · Ecology
Patch‐Size Effects on Early Succession in Southern Appalachian Forests
Donald L. Phillips, Donald J. Shure (1990) · Ecology
Anthocyanins in Cornus alternifolia, Cornus controversa, Cornus kousa and Cornus florida fruits with health benefits
Shaiju K. Vareed, Muntha K. Reddy, Robert E. Schutzki, Muraleedharan G. Nair (2005) · Life Sciences
Aboveground biomass and nitrogen allocation of ten deciduous southern Appalachian tree species
Jonathan G. Martin, Brian D Kloeppel, Tara L Schaefer, Darrin L Kimbler (1998) · Canadian Journal of Forest Research

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Cornus 12 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive)
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 84 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.