Medium-sized shrub, to 10 feet tall. Leaves egg-shaped with veins that parallel the leaf edges, untoothed, opposite each other. Flowers small, four-parted, in dense flattish clusters. Blooms in early summer. Fruits blue berries, in autumn.

Native shrub of moist places. In Wildwood, occasional around the entrance wetland.

The simple, untoothed leaves with leaf veins paralleling the edge easily identify dogwoods. Three other dogwoods are known in Wildwood. alternate-leaved dogwood has leaves that are not opposite each other. Flowering dogwood and kousa dogwood have flowers in small clusters, surrounded by large white bracts that appear to be large flowers.