Loranthus sampsonii Hance, J. Bot. 9: 133. 1871.

Shrubs ca. 0.7 m tall, branchlets and leaves densely reddish brown scurfy when young, becoming glabrous. Branches grayish, densely lenticellate. Leaves usually opposite, yellowish green, drying blackish; petioles 2-5 mm; leaf blade ovate or elliptic to oblong-lanceolate, 2-5 × 1-2.4 cm, papery to thinly leathery, lateral veins 3 or 4 pairs, abaxially obscure, base cuneate and slightly decurrent, apex obtusely acute or subacuminate. Racemes solitary or paired, mostly axillary, sometimes 3 terminal on short shoots, 2(-5)-flowered; peduncle 8-15 mm, scurfy; bracts ovate, ca. 1 mm, minutely pilose. Flowers 4-merous. Calyx urceolate, 1.5-2 mm, limb minute, subentire or repand. Mature bud subcylindric. Corolla reddish, base slightly inflated, 4-angled, stellate pubescent, petals lanceolate, 7-9 mm, apical portion reflexed, margin membranous in middle. Filaments ca. 2.5 mm; anthers 2-loculed, ca. 2 mm. Style 4-angled, 6-7 mm; stigma capitate. Berry orange or reddish, ovoid, ca. 6 × 4 mm, smooth. Fl. Apr-Jun, fr. Aug-Oct.

Recorded hosts include Camellia oleifera, Casearia membranacea, Diospyros morrisiana, Litsea elongata, and species of Euphorbiaceae, Lauraceae, and Theaceae.

Danser has indicated by herbarium determinations that this species should be included with the Indian species Helixanthera ligustrina (Wallich) Danser. The type collection and other material from Hong Kong and Guangdong has a scurfy indumentum and 2-flowered inflorescences, rather similar to the next species, but material from elsewhere in the Flora area has been described as having a stellate indumentum and up to 5-flowered inflorescences. The status of this material needs further investigation.

Forests, forest margins on mountain slopes; 100-500(-1100) m. Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, S Yunnan [N Vietnam].