林地离瓣寄生 lin di li ban ji sheng

Loranthus terrestris J. D. Hooker, Fl. Brit. India 5: 207. 1886.

Shrubs 0.5-2 m tall, branchlets and leaves densely reddish brown scurfy when young, becoming glabrous. Branches grayish, lenticellate. Leaves opposite or alternate; petiole 3-6 mm; leaf blade oblong-ovate or elliptic, 5-8 × 2-3.5 cm, papery, lateral veins 3 or 4 pairs, base cuneate and slightly decurrent, apex acuminate or obtusely subacuminate. Racemes solitary or paired, mostly axillary, sometimes terminal on short shoots, 2-4-flowered; peduncle 6-10 mm, scurfy; bracts suborbicular, 1-1.5 mm. Flowers 4-merous. Pedicel 0.5-1 mm. Calyx urceolate, 1.5-2 mm, gray scurfy, limb annular, ca. 0.5 mm, entire. Mature bud subcylindric. Corolla pink, base slightly inflated, 4-angled, petals lanceolate, 7-8 mm, apical portion reflexed, margin membranous in the middle, ca. 1 mm. Filaments ca. 2 mm; anthers 2-loculed, ca. 2 mm. Style 4-angled, ca. 7 mm; stigma capitate. Berry orange, ovoid, 7-8 × ca. 4 mm, smooth. Fl. May-Nov, fr. Jun-Aug.

Forests or thickets on mountain slopes; 900-1800 m. Xizang (Mêdog) [NE India].

This species is a root parasite, growing from the ground, and is sometimes parasitic on species of Ficus.