疏花雀梅藤 shu hua que mei teng

Shrubs scandent or erect, to 10 m tall, armed. Branchlets white or yellow tomentose, or puberulent; old branches glabrescent, conspicuously longitudinally striate, with stout spines. Leaves subopposite or alternate; stipules subulate, small, caducous; petiole 6-10 mm, adaxially canaliculate, puberulent or glabrescent; leaf blade adaxially shiny, green, brown when dry, lanceolate, ovate-lanceolate, or ovate-elliptic, 5-8 × 2-3 cm, abaxially ferruginous tomentose, hairs partly or completely deciduous later, adaxially glabrous or arachnoid-lanate, lateral veins 5 or 6(-8) pairs, conspicuously prominent abaxially, impressed adaxially, base subcordate, margin serrulate or subentire, apex obtuse or shortly acuminate. Flowers sessile, glabrous, 1- to few fascicled in lax paniculate spikes; rachis 8-15 cm, yellow-white or ferruginous puberulent; bracts triangular or fibrous. Sepals triangular. Petals obovate, shorter than sepals. Ovary 3-loculed, with 1 ovule per locule. Drupe red when mature, obovoid-globose, with 2 or 3 pyrenes. Seeds flat. Fl. Sep-Dec, fr. Mar-Apr of following year.

● Thickets on slopes, grasslands; below 700 m. W Guangxi, S Guizhou.

This species differs from Sageretia gracilis in having leaves leathery, abaxially ferruginous tomentose with base subcordate, and rachis yellow-white puberulent.