北江荛花 bei jiang rao hua

Shrubs 0.5-0.8 m tall. Branches yellowish green, turning dark purple, angular, pubescent. Leaves opposite to alternate; petiole short, 1-1.5 mm; leaf blade dark brown adaxially when dried, light brown abaxially, ovate-elliptic to elliptic or elliptic-lanceolate, 1-3.5 × 0.5-1.5 cm, papery or stiffly so, abaxially puberulous at least on veins, adaxially glabrous, base broadly cuneate or subrounded, apex acute; lateral veins 4 or 5 pairs, slender. Inflorescences terminal, often on short lateral branches, densely shortly racemose, (8-)12-flowered, pedunculate. Pedicel short. Calyx purplish red; tube 9-12 mm, slender, exterior white pubescent; lobes 4, ovate, 1-2 mm, apex slightly obtuse. Stamens 8, lower whorl inserted at middle of calyx tube, upper whorl at throat; upper anthers almost exserted from calyx tube. Disk scales 1-3, unequal, linear-oblong to broadly ovate, apex 3-lobed or -dentate. Ovary narrowly obovoid, ca. 4 mm, stipitate, apex puberulous; style very short; stigma depressed-globose. Drupe dry, ovoid-globose, enclosed by persistent calyx. Fl. and fr. Apr-Aug.

● Shrubby slopes, roadsides; 600-1100 m. S Anhui, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hunan, Zhejiang.