西藏八角莲 xi zang ba jiao lian

Plants 50-90 cm tall. Rhizomes creeping, stout, with numerous fibrous roots; aerial stems 35-55 cm high, unbranched, glabrous, angulate, scaly brown at base. Leaves opposite; petiole centrally attached, 11-25 cm; leaf blade abaxially pale yellowish green, adaxially deep green, orbicular or suborbicular in gross outline, papery, both surfaces strigose, palmately 5-7-parted to ca. midway; lobes cuneate-oblong, 8-12 × 4-7 cm, margin spinose-serrulate, ciliolate, apex acute. Inflorescence 2-6-fascicled flowers. Pedicel 2-4 cm, glabrous. Flowers attached at base of petiole, large, 4-5 cm in diam. Sepals 6, caducous, elliptic, 1.3-1.5 cm × 5-6 mm. Petals 6, white, obovate-elliptic, 2.7-2.8 × 1-1.1 cm. Stamens ca. 1 cm; filaments flat, ca. 2 mm; anthers introrse; anther connective wide, not prolonged. Pistils nearly as long as stamens; ovary stipitate; ovules numerous; style ca. 2 mm; stigma inflated, rugosely undulate. Berry red, ovoid or ovoid-ellipsoid, ca. 3 cm; style ± persistent. Seeds numerous. Fl. May, fr. Jul.

● Picea, Abies, and Pinus forests and openings in forests; 2500-3500 m. Xizang.

Shaw (in Stearn, Gen. Epimedium, 304. 2002) treated Dysosma tsayuensis as a synonym of Podophyllum aurantiocaule subsp. aurantiocaule.