康顺绿绒蒿 kang shun lü rong hao

Plants monocarpic, with an erect stem to 40 cm tall in flower, basally with few or no persistent leaf bases, greenish or flushed with red, particularly in upper part, 6-7 mm in diam., covered in dense, slender, silky, barbellate hairs, mostly 5-7 mm. Basal leaves forming a lax rosette, rather pale green with a whitish midvein; basal and lower cauline leaves elliptic-oblanceolate, 4-7.8 × 0.7-5.4 cm, attenuate below into a narrow petiole 2.5-5.4 cm, margin entire or with several coarse teeth on either side, moderately covered in hairs similar to stem; upper cauline leaves similar to basal ones but gradually decreasing in size upward on stem, shortly petiolate or sessile; upper 3 sometimes forming a false whorl below inflorescence. Inflorescence a simple raceme, 7-14-flowered; bracts present in lower part of inflorescence, leaflike, lanceolate-ovate, 20-36 × 4-5 mm. Flowers semi-nutant to horizontal. Pedicel flushed with red, 12-25 mm, thickened somewhat at top, covered in spreading hairs, particularly at top. Petals 4 or 5, brilliant maroon, broadly obovate to elliptic-oblanceolate, 3.1-4 × 1.9-3.6 cm, margin finely and unevenly toothed. Stamens numerous, forming a distinct ring around ovary but not enveloping it; filaments similar in color to petals, linear; anthers bright yellow. Ovary greenish, with stiff ascending bristles, with a glabrous caplike stylar disk at top, disk pentagonal in outline, 5-6 mm in diam., slightly narrower than ovary, shallowly lobed at margin; styles 5-7 mm, glabrous, terminating in white 4- or 5-lobed capitate stigmas. Capsule unknown. Fl. Jul-Aug.

● Rhododendron thickets and heathlands; 4200-4700 m. S Xizang (Kangshung area on E side of Qomolangma Feng).