Ptelea viscosa Linnaeus, Sp. Pl. 1: 118. 1753.

Shrubs or small trees, 1-3 m tall or higher. Branches flat, narrowly winged or ridged, with sticky juice. Leaves simple; petiole short or nearly absent; blades variable in shape and size, linear, linear-spoon-shaped, linear-lanceolate, or oblong, 5-12 × 0.5-4 cm, papery, both surfaces with sticky juice, glabrous, nitid when dry, lateral veins many, dense, very slender, margin entire or inconspicuously shallowly wavy, apex acute, obtuse, or rounded. Inflorescences terminal or axillary near apices, shorter than leaves, densely flowered, rachis and branches ridged. Pedicels 2-5 mm, sometimes to 1 cm, slender. Sepals 4, lanceolate or narrowly elliptic, ca. 3 mm, apex obtuse. Stamens 7 or 8; filaments less than 1 mm; anthers incurved, ca. 2.5 mm, glandular. Ovary ellipsoid, abaxially with sticky juice, 2- or 3-loculed; style ca. 6 mm, apex 2- or 3-lobed. Capsules obcordiform or compressed-globose, 2- or 3-winged, 1.5-2.2 cm tall, with wing 1.8-2.5 cm wide; testa membranous or papery, veined. Seeds 1 or 2 per locule, black, lenslike. Fl. late autumn, fr. late autumn-early spring. 2n = 28.

Two forms of this species are often recognized, one coastal and the other at higher elevations.

D. viscosa is not based on P. viscosa. Both names are based on different types, from Caribbean and Sri Lanka, respectively.

Forest margins, savannahs, coastal vegetation on or behind sandy beaches. Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, Sichuan, Taiwan, Yunnan [widely distributed in tropical and subtropical regions].