九龙桦 jiu long hua

Trees to 12 m tall. Branches gray-brown, glabrous; branchlets brown, densely yellow villous. Petiole 3-5 mm, yellow sericeous-villous; leaf blade ovate, ovate-elliptic, ovate-oblong, or ovate-lanceolate, 2-5 × 1-2.7 cm, subleathery, abaxially sparsely yellow sericeous-villous, adaxially sparsely white villous, base subrounded, margin doubly serrate, apex acuminate; lateral veins 16-19(-21) on each side of midvein, distinctly raised abaxially, deeply impressed adaxially. Male inflorescence 1, or 2 or 3 in a cluster, to 4.7 cm; bracts densely yellow tomentose. Female inflorescence oblong-cylindric, 1-2 cm × 5-8 mm; peduncle ca. 2 mm; bracts ca. 5 mm, ciliolate, 3-lobed, middle lobe oblong, lateral lobes spreading, ovate, ca. 1/2 as long as middle lobe. Nutlet ovate, ca. 2 × 1.5 mm, with very narrow wings. Fl. Jun, fr. Jul-Aug.

* Broad-leaved forests; circa 2400 m. SW Sichuan (Jiulong Xian)

LIN Qi published Betula jiulungensis P. C. Li ex Q. Lin (Bull. Bot. Res., Harbin 27(3): 267. 2007) after publication of the family treatment in the Flora of China, because of his interpretation of the "type for male aments" as a second type; however the FOC authors accepted P. C. Li's publication in which T. S. Ying 4779 was indicated as (type, PE) while the second was interpreted as only for the male aments.