毛柄杜鹃 mao bing du juan

Shrubs, 0.3–3 m tall; old branches deep gray, glabrous, branches short; young shoots scaly, densely brown-villous. Petiole stout, 3–5(–15) mm, scaly, hispid; leaf blade thick, leathery, oblong-elliptic, 3–4(–10) × 1.5–2(–6.5) cm; base broadly cuneate or bluntly rounded; apex obtuse and rounded or acute, apiculate; abaxial surface scales ca. 0.5 × their own diameter apart or contiguous, brown, midrib ± brown-hispid; adaxial surface sparsely scaly, brown or hispid along center when young; midrib and lateral veins raised abaxially, concave adaxially; lateral veins inconspicuously concave above. Inflorescence terminal, cymose, 2–4-flowered; bractlets present at anthesis, linear-spathulate, longer than pedicel, densely white-pubescent outside. Flowers fragrant. Pedicel 0.5–1.5 cm, scaly, sometimes also strap-shaped-setose; calyx 5-lobed to the base; lobes membranous, 4–8 mm, oblong or oblong-ovate to ovate, persistent in fruit, densely glandular scaly, margin strap-shaped-ciliate or without hairs; corolla funnelform-campanulate, intensely yellow, 2–3.5 cm, densely glandular-scaly and pubescent outside, lobes orbicular; stamens 10, unequal, shorter than corolla; filaments densely villous below, anthers oblong, pale red; ovary 5-locular, densely scaly; style slightly curved, as long as corolla or shorter than stamens, base with a few scales only. Capsule ovoid, 9–15 mm. Fl. Apr–May.

Mixed forests, Rhododendron and Rhododendron-Lyonia thickets, dry slopes; 1800–3100 m. Guizhou, Yunnan [NE Myanmar, N Vietnam].

Lower Taxa

• Rhododendron valentinianum var. oblongilobatum R. C. Fang
• Rhododendron valentinianum var. valentinianum