Jie Gu Mu

Sambucus williamsii, the Chinese elder, is a large deciduous shrub or small tree of the Adoxaceae family, typically reaching 3 to 6 m in height, with stout greyish stems and a soft white pith. The bark of older trunks is fissured and corky. Leaves are opposite, pinnately compound with five to seven (rarely more) leaflets that are ovate-lanceolate, 5 to 15 cm long, finely serrated, with an asymmetric base and an unpleasant odor when bruised. Small creamy-white five-merous flowers are borne in dense conical panicles 5 to 12 cm across in late spring. The fruit is a small globose drupe about 4 to 5 mm in diameter, ripening from green through red to glossy black-purple, containing three to five hard pyrenes. It is native to deciduous forests and ravines across China, Korea, and far eastern Russia.