全缘栝楼 quan yuan gua lou

Trichosanthes chingiana Handel-Mazzetti; T. himalensis C. B. Clarke; T. himalensis var. indivisa Chakravarty; T. okamotoi Kitamura; T. ovigera Blume; T. ovigera var. sikkimensis Kundu.

Stems slender, grooved, pubescent. Petiole 4-12 cm, striate, densely pubescent; leaf blade ovate-cordate to suborbicular, 7-19 × 7-8 cm, papery, unlobed or very shortly 3-lobed or 3-5-lobed to middle or to base; median lobe ovate, oblong, or obovate-oblong, abaxially pubescent, adaxially glabrous or very shortly puberulent, margin distantly denticulate or dentate, apex acuminate. Male peduncle 10-26 cm, striate, densely pubescent; bracts lanceolate or oblanceolate, ca. 1.6 × 0.5-0.6 cm, attenuate to base, margin triangular-dentate, apex acuminate; calyx tube subcylindric, slightly dilated at apex, ca. 5 cm; segments triangular-ovate, 7-10 × 2-3 mm, entire. Female flowers solitary; pedicel 1-1.3 cm, striate, densely pubescent; calyx tube cylindric, 2-5 × 0.2-0.3 cm, glabrous or pubescent; ovary ovoid, 1-1.5 × 0.3-0.5 cm. Fruit ovoid or oblong, 5-7 × 2.5-4 cm, smooth, base rounded, apex acuminate, beaked. Seeds subquadrangular, 7-9 × 7-8 mm, longitudinally surrounded by 2 thick ridges, thick near middle; 3-loculed with 2 lateral locules empty. Fl. May-Sep, fr. Sep-Dec. 2n = 22.

Thickets along valleys, open forests on mountain slopes; 700-2500 m. Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Yunnan [India, Indonesia, Japan, Nepal, Thailand, Vietnam].

One of us (Jeffrey) treats the following three species (i.e., Trichosanthes baviensis, T. trichocarpa, and T. cucumeroides) as synonyms of T. pilosa.