薄核藤属 bao he teng shu

Shrubs climbing, lenticellate. Leaves alternate, petiolate; leaf blade cordate-ovate, veins 7-9, basally palmate, margin sparsely serrulate. Plants dioecious. Flowers small, in simple or complex extra-axillary racemes. Staminate flowers: calyx 5-lobed, persistent, not accrescent; petals 5, slightly coherent at base, apex inflexed, valvate; stamens alternate with petals; filaments broad, short, with 2 compressed, lateral, bottle-shaped appendages at base; anthers erect, 2-lobed; connectives small, protruding; ovary undeveloped. Pistillate flowers: calyx and petals as in staminate flowers; reduced stamens 4-6; anthers absent or subsagittate, undeveloped, alternate with 5 glands; glands unequal, rounded-toothed; ovary ovoid, sessile; style short, cylindric, apex 2- or 3-lobed; stigma capitate. Drupe obliquely ovoid, compressed; mesocarp thin; endocarp crustaceous. Cotyledons broadly orbicular or unequally obcordate-ovate, thin.

One species: tropical Asia.

Lower Taxon

• Natsiatum herpeticum Buchanan-Hamilton ex Arnott