三江瘤果茶 san jiang liu guo cha

Shrubs or trees, 2-5 m tall. Young branches brown; current year branchlets reddish brown, ribbed, glabrous. Petiole ca. 1.2 cm, glabrous; leaf blade elliptic, oblong-elliptic, or oblong, 9-15.5 × 3-5.5 cm, thinly leathery, abaxially pale green, brown glandular punctate, and becoming pale brown when dry, adaxially dark green and shiny, both surfaces glabrous, midvein abaxially elevated and adaxially slightly raised, secondary veins 8-10 on each side of midvein and raised on both surfaces, base broadly cuneate to obtuse, margin sparsely denticulate, apex acute to acuminate. Flowers axillary or subterminal, solitary or paired, 5-6 cm in diam., subsessile. Bracteoles ca. 4, semiorbicular to broadly ovate, 3-8 mm, gray pubescent or glabrescent. Sepals 5 or 6, ± persistent, broadly ovate to suborbicular, 1.5-2.5 cm, densely gray sericeous. Petals 6-8, white flushed with red or red, broadly obovate, 3-4 × 2-3 cm, apex emarginate; inner 5 petals connate for ca. 3 mm. Stamens 2-3 cm; filaments glabrous; outer filament whorl basally connate for 0.8-1.2 cm. Ovary depressed globose, minutely rugulose, basally glabrous, apically white tomentose, 4- or 5-loculed; styles 4 or 5, distinct, 2-3 cm, grayish white villous. Capsule globose to oblate, 2.7-3.3 × ca. 3.5 cm, usually 5-loculed with 1 or 2 seeds per locule; pericarp ca. 5 mm thick, tuberculate, splitting into 4 or 5 valves. Seeds brown, globose to semiglobose, 1-1.5 cm in diam., reddish brown villous. Fl. Nov-Dec, fr. Sep-Oct. 2n = 30*.

● Forests, forests along rivers; 700-1200 m. Guizhou (Qinglong, Xingyi), Yunnan (Luoping).