Not a rose but a beautiful deciduous shrub, Guelder-rose grows by lakes, in hedgerows and in thickets, sometimes reaching as high as 4 metres. In June and July it displays truly stunning, dense, flat-topped clusters of fragrant, creamy flowers. On the outer edges of these heads, there is a circle of 5-petalled flowers (15-20mm across) which have neither stamens nor pistils and are therefore sterile, and these surround a disc of smaller, 5-petalled flowers (4-7mm across) which are fertile. These are pollinated by insects. The leaves of this shrub are palmately lobed and irregularly toothed and turn red in late autumn. At that time the tree bears juicy shiny red berries which contain one seed. This is a native plant and it belongs to the Moschatel or Adoxaceae family.
I first found this shrub close to Lough Bunny, Co Clare in 2005 and photographed it in Tullycanna in 2009.
If you are satisfied you have correctly identified this plant, please submit your sighting to the National Biodiversity Data Centre
