Viburnum cassinoides
Common name: 
Witherod Viburnum
Northern Wild Raisin
Pronunciation: 
vi-BUR-num kas-i-NOY-dez
Family: 
Adoxaceae, Caprifoliaceae
Genus: 
Synonyms: 
V. nudum var. cassinoides
Type: 
Broadleaf
Native to (or naturalized in) Oregon: 
No
  • Broadleaf deciduous shrub, rather large, to 6-10 ft (1.8-3 m) tall with a similar spread, multi-stemmed, but sometimes a small tree, dense compact and rounded form.  Leaves opposite, simple, elliptic, ovate or oblong, 4-10 cm long, 2-5.5 cm wide, tip acute or bluntly pointed, base rounded or wedge-shaped, margin irregularly and shallowly round- serrate, dull dark green, but chocolate or bronze-tinted when young, lower surface nearly glabrous (without hairs) but somewhat scurfy (covered with small branlike scales).    Flowers yellow-white, about 5 mm across, fertile, in dense, flat-topped clusters (cymes) 12 cm wide.   Fruit ovoid to subglobose, 7 mm long, initially green then turning pink, then red, later blue, and finally black in fall; often ripening is not symphonized and all the fruit colors may be present in a single cluster.
  • Sun to part shade
  • Hardy to USDA Zone 2    Native to range from Newfoundland to Manitoba and Minnesota, south to Georgia.
  • Witherod, withe rod or withe-rod: comes from the former use of its branches for switches by old-time schoolmasters (Zucker, 1995).  Withe: Old English word for a flexible twig.
  • cassinoides: resembling Ilex cassine, Dahoon Holly.  Native to the eastern United States from Virginia to Florida to Louisiana.
Click image to enlarge
  • plant habit, flowering

    plant habit, flowering

  • flower cluster

    flower cluster

  • new leaves

    new leaves

  • plant habit, fall

    plant habit, fall

  • leaves and flower bud, fall

    leaves and flower bud, fall