梗花椒 geng hua jiao

Shrubs or trees, 1-3 m tall, glabrous except for leaflet blades. Prickles to 1.5 cm. Branchlets blackish brown when dry. Leaves 7-17-foliolate; leaflet blades subsessile or with petiolule to 2 mm, opposite, lanceolate to ovate but suborbicular at base of leaf rachis, 1-5 × 0.7-1.3 cm, papery, abaxially purplish red when young, turning grayish green when mature, and reddish brown to dark blackish red when dry, oil glands sparse and protruding on both surfaces when dry, midvein abaxially rust-colored flocculent and adaxially impressed, margin serrulate. Inflorescences terminal. Perianth in 2 irregular series or 1 series, with 6-8 ± undifferentiated tepals. Tepals usually lanceolate, 2-3 mm. Male flowers: stamens 5-8; connective with oil gland at tip. Female flowers: carpels 3 or 4; styles recurved. Rachis of infructescences purplish red. Fruit pedicel purplish red, 5-8(-10) mm; follicles purplish red, ca. 5 × 4 mm, base attenuate into a 1-3 mm stipe, oil glands slightly protruding when dry. Seeds ca. 4 × 3.5 mm. Fl. Apr-May, fr. Jul-Aug.

● Forests; 100-800 m. NW Fujian, N Guangdong, NE Guangxi, S Hunan.