First, 'Red Rover' is not a redtwig dogwood (Cornus sericea or Cornus alba). It is a cultivar of Cornus amomum (syn. C. obliqua), aka silky dogwood. Stems are at best a purplish-brown - maybe even a maroon color - but not the intense red of sericea or alba and not particularly distinctive in winter. But it does get very attractive fall color and is tolerant of a lot of adverse growing conditions. And can sucker like its other shrub cousins if left to its own devices.

Uh oh....I thought it was a redtwig dogwood. Guess that's what I get for assuming that a plant placed between two varieties of redtwig would also be a redtwig. Sigh. Well, I'm certainly not digging them up, I guess they are what they are. It is advertised to get blue fruit, which will be nice if it persists at least a little while on the bare stems. I grow winterberry holly -- nothing to write home about most of the year but man are those bright red berries gorgeous against the fresh-fallen snow! Although, come to think of it, I have "Little Henry" sweetspire, and I noted the stems were maroon over the winter, and actually they looked quite nice against the color of my house. So all is not lost LOL!

The oldie, but goodie, c.sibirica 'Elegantissisma', is still the finest, all season dogwood for my money...although, in the damper woodland edges, I have been looking more at salix britzensis and the like (especially the deep purple stemmed s.daphnoides).

Camp, I think you mean Cornus alba 'Elegantissima' - variegated Tatarian dogwood. 'Sibirica' is just another cultivar of C. alba, not a distinct species.

The fruit will be consumed by the birds in the fall.

fwiw .... at my first house ....

i had both the yellow and red versions.. no clue on the latin names ... probably bought in a plastic sleeve with generic name ...

i seem to recall they need to be cut down to maintain new growth color and i after a year or two.. i forgot to do that.. and im pretty sure.. they got much larger than claimed ...

or.... i dreamed it all ...

its one of the few plants.. i was glad to leave behind ... lol ... but i didnt have the WWW back then ... to help me ...

ken

Both Cornus sericea and C. amomum are native plants that are adapted to a wide range of both soil, moisture and light conditions and can be indispensable in the landscape for tough situations. An added bonus is that they are attractive to pollinators and wildlife.

FWIW, Cornus sericea grows wild along various road and freeway verges here and gets no attention whatsoever. However, those red stems really do stand out in the winter landscape without any pruning to intensify coloring.

Cheers GG, exactly so (am a bit vague about nomenclature and a bit idle about checking too). But still, an oldie but goodie which can take brutal annual stooling if that is your wont (it certainly is with my local council gardening dept.)

I had an elegantissima, and it was due to it that I realized that voles like dogwoods . . .

I wasn't thinking about voles when I said they attract wildlife!! But I can see how that might be :-)

Camp, I use both Elegantissima and its more compact cousin Ivory Halo, frequently in my designs. They are both very attractive and virtually no-care shrubs. Personally I prefer the yellow variegated cultivars like Hedgerow Gold or Gouchaultii because of the better fall coloring.

I have never been very impressed with Arctic Fire, Winter Flame or similar cultivars of twig dogwood. While the colored stems look good in winter, their inseason appearance is pretty blah.

Inclined to agree although there is a local planting row of Midwinter Fire placed against a longish yew hedge, which is truly spectacular for a good few months...but this is, I think, the classic position to display these daintier dogwoods...whereas most of us do not have space for 20metre formal yew hedges fronted by 3 dozen dogwoods.

I have a red-twigged dogwood and rubus thibetana combo (not the insane r.cockburnianus but the more mannerly 'Silver Fern'), set about with black ophiogon and snowdrops, in my (ahem) 'winter' garden (actually, one tiny corner of the allotment)...which I really need to translate to a more epic planting in the wood. The snowdrop and Silver Fern foliage are an almost surreal chalky greeny-blue that I have only seen in leymus magellanicus or certain penstemons.

I thought about the Ivory Halo, but decided against it because of it's size -- just too big for the space. The foliage sure is gorgeous, though. Eh, I've already planted the Red Rover, I'll wait and see what they do -- as long as they don't turn into a rangy mess they should be fine, I really just wanted some shrubs to anchor the perennial plantings, they're not the star of the show here, and I'll be happy with any reasonable twig color and fruit.

You know, the silky dogwood have really grown on me since I bought them last year. It took a few moves, but once I found the right spot visually for them, I've come to enjoy them. The looser habit suits the visual heaviness of my house, and the reddish-brown bare branches look nice against the log siding in the winter. They're getting ready to flower now, hopefully I'll see a few berries this year. So yea - glad I bought them.

I too just picked up 5 of the red rovers to replace a row of overgrown yew in front of my house. Can you tell me how fast they grow? They're about a foot high now, in July. How long before they reach their 4-5 foot size? How tall are yours after a year? Thanks!

Hmmm, hard to say -- they were pretty decent size when I bought them last year, they have gotten larger but it's more of a filling out effect rather than upward growth, although they have grown taller. I'd say they grow at a decent clip. Not helpful, I know.... I can tell you that they really don't miss a beat if you need to move them around or trim out some straggly growth. Like I said, they really have grown on me.