牯岭凤仙花 gu ling feng xian hua

Plants annual, to 90 cm tall. Stem erect or ascending in lower part, robust, succulent, branched, glabrous, nodes swollen in lower part, with many fibrous roots. Leaves alternate; petiole 4-8 cm; leaf blade elliptic, 5-10 × 3-4 cm, glabrous, lateral veins 5-7 pairs, curved, base cuneate, margin coarsely crenate, teeth mucronulate, apex caudate-acuminate. Inflorescences 1-flowered; peduncles ca. 1 cm, to 2 cm at fruiting. Pedicels 2-bracteate above middle; bracts persistent, ovate-lanceolate, ca. 3 mm, herbaceous. Flowers yellowish. Lateral sepals 2, broadly ovate, ca. 1 × 0.5-0.6 cm, membranous, 9-veined, margin entire, apex mucronulate. Lower sepal yellow striate, saccate, abruptly narrowed into a hooked spur; spur ca. 8 mm, 2-lobed. Upper petal suborbicular, ca. 1 cm in diam., apex emarginate, shortly rostellate, abaxial midvein green cristate; lateral united petals clawed, 1.5-2 cm, 2-lobed; basal lobes oblong, small, apex acuminate or caudate; distal lobes dolabriform, large, apex obtuse; auricle obtuse, cornute. Filaments linear, slightly swollen above; anthers ovoid-orbicular, apex obtuse. Ovary erect, fusiform. Capsule linear-cylindric, 3-3.5 cm. Seeds many, brown, subglobose, smooth. Fl. Jul-Sep. 2n = 20*.

● Forest understories, moist places in valleys, grasslands; 300-700 m. Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Zhejiang.