喙果鸡血藤 hui guo ji xue teng

Basionym: Millettia tsui F. P. Metcalf, Lingnan Sci. J. 19: 554. 1940.

Lianas, 3-10 m. Stems dark brown, terete, straight, fine ridged, brown tomentose, glabrescent, without lenticels. Leaves 3(or 5)-foliolate; rachis 12-28 cm, including petiole 5-8 cm; stipels absent; leaflet blades broadly elliptic to elliptic, (6-)10-18 × 5-8 cm, subleathery, both surfaces glabrous and shiny, reticulate veins prominent, base obtuse to broadly cuneate, apex rounded and with a cusp. Panicles terminal, 15-30 cm; flow­ering branchlets spreading, often leafy at base, brown tomen­tose, nodes congested. Flowers 1.5-2.5 cm. Corolla pale yellow flushed with red or lilac; standard oblong, without basal cal­luses, outside densely sericeous. Ovary stipitate, sericeous, with 4-7 ovules. Legume ellipsoid when 1-seeded and ca. 5.5 × 4 cm, linear-oblong when 2- or 3-seeded and ca. 7 × 3 cm, in­flated but contracted between seeds, brown tomentose but gen­erally glabrescent, base tapering to 5 mm stipe, apex with a hard hooked beak. Seeds 1-3 per legume, dark brown, subglobose to oblately spheroid, 2-2.5 × 1-2.5 cm. Fl. Jul-Sep, fr. Oct-Dec.

● Thickets, woodlands in valleys; 200-1600 m. Guangdong, Guangxi, S Guizhou, Hainan, S Hunan, S Yunnan.

The stem and root are used medicinally. The bast fibers are rather tough and used for making rope. The seeds are edible after stewing.