石柯 shi ke

Pasania lithocarpaea Oersted, Vidensk. Meddel. Dansk Naturhist. Foren. Kjøbenhavn 1866: 84. 1867.

Trees to 20 m tall. Leaves not seen. Infructescences 14-28 cm; rachis terete, light brownish gray, 1-2 cm thick, epidermis flaky, reticulate, sparsely lenticellate; lenticels slightly raised. Cupules 5-9 fused in clusters, only 1 or 2 developed, globose or nearly so, 3.5-5 cm in diam., completely enclosing nut, apically flat or rounded, wall 2-5 mm thick and spongy; bracts ± imbricate in young cupules and squamose but united into 8-12 concentric rings and inconspicuous with age. Nut broadly ellipsoid to subglobose, adnate to cupule except apically, apex flat, wall 1.5-4 mm thick and firmly woody.

Broad-leaved evergreen forests; circa 800 m. SE Xizang (Mêdog Xian) [NE India]

An incompletely known species which Oersted described as Pasania lithocarpaea, based merely on 3 cupules. Only three infructescences have been seen by the authors.