薄叶金花茶 bo ye jin hua cha

Camellia longzhouensis J. Y. Luo; C. xiashiensis S. Ye Liang & C. Z. Deng.

Shrubs or trees, 1.5-5 m tall. Current year branchlets purplish brown, glabrous; terminal buds large, terete, gray puberulent. Petiole 6-10 mm, glabrous, adaxially grooved; leaf blade oblong-elliptic to oblong, 10-19 × 3.5-6.5 cm, leathery to thinly leathery, abaxially pale green, brown glandular punctate, and becoming pale brown when dry, adaxially dark green, both surfaces glabrous, midvein abaxially elevated and adaxially channeled, secondary veins 10-12 on each side of midvein, abaxially raised, and adaxially impressed, base cuneate to obtuse, margin serrulate, apex abruptly shortly caudate to caudate. Flowers axillary, solitary, ca. 4 cm in diam. Pedicel 3-4 mm; bracteoles 5 or 6, ± covering pedicel, semiorbicular, 1-2 mm, outside gray puberulent, inside glabrous. Sepals 5, broadly ovate to suborbicular, 3-3.5 mm, outside gray puberulent, inside glabrous, margin ciliolate. Petals ca. 9, yellow; outer 2 petals sepaloid, suborbicular, ca. 5 mm, outside puberulent; inner petals broadly obovate to oblong-elliptic, 1-1.9 × 0.8-1.5 cm, basally connate and adnate to androecium. Stamens ca. 1.3 cm, glabrous; outer filament whorl basally connate into a 2-3 mm tube. Ovary white tomentose, 3-loculed; styles 3, distinct, 1-1.2 cm, glabrous or basally pubescent. Capsule flattened globose, (2 or)3-coccal, ca. 1.5 × 2.5-4.5 cm, 2- or 3-grooved; pericarp ca. 1 mm thick. Seeds brown, globose or hemispherical, yellow pubescent. Fl. Dec, fr. Sep. 2n = 30*.

● Evergreen broad-leaved forests on rock or hills; 100-800 m. Guangxi (Longzhou, Pingxiang).