刺果冷水花 ci guo leng shui hua

Herbs or subshrubs perennial, glabrous, dioecious. Stems light green when dry, 30-100 cm; stems, stipules, and petioles densely covered with cystoliths. Stipules deciduous, green, oblong, ca. 10 mm, papery, longitudinally 2-ribbed; petiole unequal in length, 1-4 cm; leaf blade abaxially pale green, adaxially green, narrowly lanceolate, subequal in size, 7-15 × 2-4.5 cm, thinly papery, 3-veined, lateral veins 10 each side, prominent abaxially, base rounded or subcordate, margin crenate from base, apex acuminate or long acuminate. Inflorescences in pairs; male cymes dichotomously branched 2-3 times, 1-1.5 cm; proximal bracts oblong, ca. 2 mm, distal bracts ovate, ca. 1 mm; female cymes dichotomously branched 3 or 4 times, ca. 1.5 cm. Male flowers subsessile, in bud ca. 1.2 mm; perianth lobes 4, ovate-oblong, connate 1/2 of length, subapically corniculate; stamens 4; rudimentary ovary cylindric, ca. 0.3 mm. Female flowers shortly pedicellate; perianth lobes triangular-ovate; staminodes oblong. Achene ovoid, ca. 1 mm, compressed, oblique, sparsely spinulose-verrucose. Fl. Mar-Apr, fr. May-Jun.

Shaded wet places in forests; 500-900 m. Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan [N Vietnam].