台湾苹婆 tai wan ping po

Sterculia luzonica Warburg; ?S. richardiana Baillon.

Small trees. Leaves simple; petiole 3-5 cm, minutely pilose; leaf blade ovate or elliptic-ovate, 8-17 × 7-9 cm, papery or thinly leathery, abaxially and adaxially glabrous or minutely yellowish brown stellate between basal veins, basal veins 5-7, base cordate, margin entire, apex acuminate or acute. Inflorescence paniculate, flat-topped, axillary. Pedicels ca. 11 mm. Male flowers: calyx ellipsoid, ca. 5 mm, lobes triangular, 1/3 as long as calyx, spreading outward. Female flowers: ovary 5-loculed, with 5 longitudinal grooves, densely puberulent. Style very short; stigmas 5, globose. Follicle ovoid sickle-shaped, 3-6 × 2.5-3 cm, thickly leathery, 2-seeded, abaxially reddish brown hairy, apex obtuse. Seeds nearly ellipsoid, 1.5-2 cm. Fl. Jun.

Taiwan (Huoshao Dao, Lan Yu) [Malaysia, Philippines; Madagascar].

The apparent disjunction of Sterculia ceramica between SE Asia and Madagascar is noteworthy. The place of publication of S. ceramica is often given as R. Brown in Bennett, Pl. Jav. Rar. 233. 1844, which was published in November 1844 and was thus predated by Brown’s preprint published in June of the same year.