双花金丝桃 shuang hua jin si tao

Shrubs, 0.5-1.5 m tall; branches often spreading and pendulous. Stems 4-lined and ancipitous when young, eventually 2-lined to terete; internodes 0.9-3.5 cm, shorter than leaves. Leaves subsessile; blade oblong or oblong-lanceolate to elliptic or ovate, 1.8-4.5 × 0.6-2.2 cm, thickly papery, abaxially paler but not glaucous; laminar glands dots, adaxially sometimes prominent; abaxial glands absent; main lateral veins 1- or 2-paired, the upper sometimes forming distinct intramarginal vein, tertiary reticulation faint or invisible; base broadly to narrowly cuneate, margin incrassate, apex acute to obtuse or rounded-apiculate. Inflorescence 1(-3)-flowered, terminal and on solitary or paired short subsidiary branches from up to 14 nodes below, the whole narrowly cylindric; bracts leaflike, bracteoles deciduous, reduced. Pedicels 3-4 mm. Flowers 2-3 cm in diam., stellate; buds ovoid, apex acute to obtuse. Sepals free or slightly connate, erect, equal to subequal, broadly ovate or triangular-ovate or subcircular to oblong-lanceolate, (1-)1.5-3 × 1-2.5 mm, laminar glands mostly lines, margin entire, apex subacute to rounded. Petals bright yellow [or rarely white], obovate, 0.9-1.5 cm × 5-7 mm, 3-6 × as long as sepals, margin entire, eglandular, apiculus obsolete or absent. Stamen fascicles each with 5-11 stamens, longest 6-10 mm, ca. 0.65 × as long as petals. Ovary ± narrowly ellipsoid, 2.5-3.5 × 1.5-2.5 mm; styles 4-6(-7) mm, 1-2 × as long as ovary; stigmatic mass capitate to ellipsoid or cylindric. Capsule narrowly cylindric to cylindric-conic, 5-11 × 3-5.5 mm. Seeds dark reddish brown, 0.6-1.5 mm, narrowly carinate with apical expansions or ± deeply winged; testa linear-reticulate. Fl. May-Aug, fr. Aug-Dec.

Open stony ground, mountain slopes, roadsides; 300-1800 m. Taiwan [Philippines (Luzon)].

Hypericum geminiflorum comprises two subspecies, one (subsp. geminiflorum) occurring at relatively low altitudes in SE Taiwan and Luzon, the other (subsp. simplicistylum) at higher altitudes in C and NW Taiwan.