白桐树 bai tong shu

Erytrochilus indicus Reinwardt ex Blume, Bijdr. 615. 1826; Claoxylon parviflorum Hooker & Arnott (1837), not A. Jussieu (1824).

Shrubs or small trees, 3-12 m tall, dioecious. Branchlets gray tomentulose. Petiole 5-15 cm, with 2 glands; leaf blade ovate to broadly ovate, 10-22 × 6-13 cm, papery, both surfaces pilose, base cuneate to obtuse or slightly oblique, margin crenulate or dentate, apex acute or obtuse. Male inflorescences 10-30 cm, tomentulose; bracts triangular, ca. 2 mm. Male flowers 3-7 per bract; pedicel ca. 4 mm; sepals 3 or 4, ca. 3 mm, pilose; stamens 15-25; interstaminal glands ca. 0.5 mm. Female inflorescences 5-20 cm. Female flowers often 1 per bract; sepals 3, subtriangular, tomentulose; disk 3-lobed or sinuous; ovary globose, tomentose; styles 3, ca. 2 mm, plumose. Capsule 3-lobed, 7-8 mm in diam., tomentulose, sutures raised. Seeds subglobose; testa red. Fl. and fr. Mar-Dec.

Plains, mountain valleys, forests, scrub; below 100-500(-1500) m. Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, S Yunnan [India, Indonesia, Malaysia, New Guinea, Thailand, Vietnam].

Merrill incorrectly interpreted Croton polot N. L. Burman as this species and introduced the name Claoxylon polot (N. L. Burman) Merrill.