火桐 huo tong

Sterculia colorata Roxburgh, Pl. Coromandel 1: 26. 1795; Erythropsis colorata (Roxburgh) Burkill; E. roxburghiana Schott & Endlicher, nom. illeg. superfl.; Karaka colorata (Roxburgh) Rafinesque.

Deciduous trees, up to 15 m tall. Branchlets gray-black when desiccate, minutely gray puberulent. Petiole 10-15 cm; leaf blade broadly cordate, 17.5-25 × 18-20 cm, thinly leathery, both surfaces sparsely yellowish stellate puberulent, basal veins 5-7, veinlets prominently raised on both surfaces, nearly parallel, base deeply cordate, apex 3-5-lobed, middle lobe ca. 5 cm, apex obtuse, lateral lobes ca. 3 cm. Inflorescence cymose-paniculate, up to 7 cm, densely orange-red stellate puberulent. Pedicels 4-5 mm, puberulent. Calyx funnel-shaped, base nearly cuneate, ca. 20 × 7-8 mm, apex 5-lobed, abaxially densely stellate puberulent with orange hairs, adaxially densely puberulent, lobes ovate-triangular, ca. 4 mm, apex acute. Male flower: androgynophore 10-12 mm, stellate puberulent. Female flower: ovary 5-locular, nearly separated, glabrous. Style short; stigma curved outward. Follicle stalked, red or purple when mature, foliaceous, tongue-shaped, 5-7 cm, 2-4-seeded, with apparent venation. Seeds black, globose, ca. 6 mm in diam. Fl. Mar-Apr.

Forested slopes; 700-1000 m. S Yunnan [Bhutan, India (including
Andaman Islands), Indonesia (Sumatra), Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam].

The place of publication of Firmiana colorata is often given as R. Brown in Bennett, Pl. Jav. Rar. 235. 1844, which was published in November 1844 and was thus predated by Brown’s preprint published in June of the same year.