沙生柽柳 sha sheng cheng liu

Large shrubs or small trees, 3-5(-7) m tall. Branches often pendulous, slender. Leaves reduced, those in vegetative branches almost all amplexicaul, vaginate, slightly oblique outward, gray-green in spring, mostly yellow-green in summer, broadly triangular, only ca. 1 mm; those in growing branches ovate-lanceolate, base broad, semiamplexicaul, slightly decurrent, apex acuminate. Racemes at apices of growing branches in summer and autumn, laxly flowered, 5-7(-15) cm × 6-8 mm, clustered into terminal, large panicles; bracts broadly triangular-ovate, ca. 0.9 mm, ca. 1/2 as long as pedicels, base broad, semiamplexicaul. Pedicels ca. 2 mm. Flowers 5-merous. Sepals 5, yellowish green, ovate, shorter than pedicels. Petals 5, slightly reflexed, pink, obovate or narrowly obovate, 3-4 × 2-2.5 mm, deciduous after anthesis. Disk 5-lobed. Stamens 5; filaments straight, base slightly enlarged, inserted at apex of disk lobes; anthers cordate, apex obtuse. Styles 3, united at base; stigmas capitate, short. Capsule yellow, conic, 5-7 × ca. 2.5 mm, 3-septicidal, 15-20-seeded; seeds black-purple, large, 2-2.5(-3) × ca. 0.7 mm. Fl. Jul-Sep(-Oct). 2n = 24*.

● Sand dunes. Gansu, Xinjiang.