小叶红叶藤 xiao ye hong ye teng

Connarus microphyllus Hooker & Arnott, Bot. Beechey Voy. 179. 1833; Rourea minor (Gaertner) Leenhouts subsp. microphylla (Hooker & Arnott) Vidal; Santaloides microphyllum (Hooker & Arnott) Schellenberg.

Lianas or climbing shrubs, much branched, 1–4 m tall. Branchlets brown, glabrous or sparsely pubescent when young. Leaves odd-pinnate, rarely 1-foliolate; petiole, rachis, and petiolules glabrous; leaflets 3–8(–13)-paired; leaflet blade slightly glaucous-green abaxially, glossy adaxially, ovate or lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate, 1.5–4 × 0.5–2 cm, papery to subleathery, glabrous on both surfaces, lateral veins 4–7-paired, spreading, jointed near margin, base cuneate to rounded, often oblique, margin entire, apex obtuse and acuminate. Inflorescences axillary in distal leaf axils or pseudoterminal, paniculate with 1–5 axes, usually 3–6 cm, central one often longer, others shorter; rachis and pedicels glabrous; bracts and bracteoles indistinct. Flowers 4–5 mm in diam., fragrant. Sepals ovate, 2–3 mm, about as broad as long, glabrous or minutely tomentose along margin abaxially. Petals white, yellowish, or pink, elliptic, 4–5 × 1–2 mm, glabrous, longitudinally striate, apex acute. Stamens ca. 10; filaments unequal, longer ones to 6 mm, shorter ones ca. 4 mm; anthers longitudinally lobed. Carpels free, 3–5 mm; ovary cylindric. Follicle red when mature, cylindric or obliquely obovoid-cylindric, slightly curved, 1.2–1.5 × 0.5–1 cm, dehiscing along adaxial suture, longitudinally striate, base with persistent sepals, apex acute. Seed orange, oblong, ca. 1 cm, with membranous aril at base. Fl. Mar–Sep, fr. May–Mar of following year.

Sparse forests, slopes; 100--600 m. Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan [India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Vietnam].