小花金花茶 xiao hua jin hua cha

Shrubs 2-3 m tall. Young branches yellowish brown; current year branchlets purplish red, glabrous; terminal bud small, ovoid, glabrous. Petiole 6-8 mm, glabrous; leaf blade broadly obovate, obovate-elliptic, or elliptic, 8.5-10.5(-17.5) × 3.5-5.5(-7.5) cm, leathery, abaxially pale green and brown glandular punctate, adaxially dark green and shiny, both surfaces glabrous, midvein abaxially elevated and adaxially channeled, secondary veins 7 or 8 on each side of midvein, abaxially elevated, and adaxially impressed, base broadly cuneate to obtuse, margin serrulate, apex acute to shortly caudate. Flowers axillary, solitary or to 3 in a cluster, 1.5-2.5 cm in diam. Pedicel 3-5(-7) mm; bracteoles 5-7, not covering pedicel, ovate to semiorbicular, 1.5-2.5 mm, glabrous, margin ciliolate. Sepals 5, suborbicular, 3-4 × 4-6 mm, outside puberulent, inside glabrous, margin ciliolate. Petals 6-8, pale yellow but slightly pink in bud; outer 2 or 3 petals suborbicular, 6-7 mm; inner petals elliptic to obovate-elliptic, 9-15 × 5-8.5 mm, basally connate for ca. 2 mm. Stamens 7-9 mm, glabrous; outer filament whorl basally connate into a ca. 3 mm tube. Ovary globose, ca. 1 mm in diam., white pubescent or glabrescent; styles 3, distinct, 6-8 mm, glabrous. Capsule oblate, 1.5-2 × ca. 3 cm; pericarp 1-2 mm thick. Seeds brown, hemispherical, glabrous. Fl. Dec-Jan, fr. Sep-Oct.

● Evergreen broad-leaved forests; 100-400 m. Guangxi (Ningming).