Alternate name: Speckled Alder

Family: Betulaceae, Birch view all from this family

Description Shrub with spreading, slender branches or sometimes a small tree with several trunks and a rounded crown; often forming thickets.
Height: 30' (9 m).
Diameter: 6" (15 cm).
Leaves: in 3 rows; 1 1/2-4" (4-10 cm) long, 1-2 1/2" (2.5-6 cm) wide. Ovate or elliptical, wavy-lobed and doubly saw-toothed, rounded at base, with 6-9 nearly straight parallel veins on each side. Dull dark green above, light yellow-green and sometimes finely hairy beneath.
Bark: gray, thin, smooth, becoming reddish-gray and scaly.
Twigs: slender, reddish and hairy when young, becoming gray, with 3-angled pith.
Flowers: tiny; in early spring before leaves. Male yellowish, in catkins 1-2 3/4" (2.5-7 cm) long. Female brownish, in narrow cones 1/4" (6 mm) long.
Cones: 3/8-5/8" (10-15 mm) long; 3-9 clustered on short stalks; elliptical, with many hard black scales; maturing in late summer and remaining attached. Tiny, elliptical, flat nutlets.

Habitat Banks of streams, swamps, and mountain canyons in moist soils.

Range C. Alaska, Yukon, and Mackenzie southeast mostly in mountains to New Mexico and c. California; near sea level in north; to 9000' (2743 m) in south.

Discussion This is the common alder throughout the Rockies. The Navajo Indians made a red dye from the powdered bark.