菱果柯 ling guo ke

Quercus taitoensis Hayata, J. Coll. Sci. Imp. Univ. Tokyo 30(1): 297. 1911; Lithocarpus brunneus Rehder; L. nakaii Hayata; L. rhombocarpus (Hayata) Hayata; L. suishaensis Kanehira & Yamamoto; L. tremulus Chun; Pasania nakaii (Hayata) Nakai; P. suishaensis (Kanehira & Yamamoto) Nakai; P. taitoensis (Hayata) J. C. Liao; Q. rhombocarpa Hayata; Synaedrys nakaii (Hayata) Kudo; S. rhombocarpa (Hayata) Kudo; S. taitoensis (Hayata) Koidzumi.

Trees to 20 m tall. Branches of current year glabrous, sparsely puberulent, or densely pubescent. Petiole 1.5-3.5 cm; leaf blade ovate, broadly elliptic, narrowly elliptic, or sometimes obovate-elliptic, 6-12 × 2-5 cm, leathery, abaxially with lamellate scalelike glands and oily and shiny when young, base broadly cuneate to sometimes cuneate and often ± asymmetric, margin entire, apex abruptly acuminate and shortly caudate; secondary veins 7-10 on each side of midvein, usually adaxially impressed; tertiary veins abaxially not visible or rarely slender, reticulate. Male inflorescences usually solitary in leaf axils, 4-6 cm. Female inflorescences to 20 cm; cupules in clusters of ca. 3. Infructescence rachis 3-7 mm thick. Cupule plate-shaped, 1-1.5 cm in diam., covering base of nut, wall woody and basally thickened; bracts usually connate into concentric rings but apical ones imbricate, triangular, small, appressed. Nut conical, 1.2-1.8 × 1-1.5 cm, often white farinose, apex shortly pointed or rarely flat, wall 0.5-1 mm thick; scar 5-9 mm in diam., concave. Fl. May-Sep, fr. Aug-Dec of following year.

* Mixed mesophytic forests; circa 1500 m. Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Yunnan, Zhejiang

Very close to Lithocarpus litseifolius, and could be treated as conspecific.