露珠杜鹃 lu zhu du juan

Shrubs or small trees, 2–9 m tall; young shoots thinly tomentose and with glandular hairs that soon wither. Petiole cylindric, 10–20 mm, glabrescent; leaf blade leathery, oblanceolate to narrowly elliptic, 7–14 × 2–4 cm; base rounded or broadly cuneate; margin entire or undulate; apex acuminate; both surfaces glabrous when mature; midrib distinct and prominent abaxially, deeply grooved adaxially; lateral veins 17–20-paired, impressed. Inflorescence laxly racemose-umbellate, 7–15-flowered; rachis 20–40 mm, pubescent and rufous glandular-hairy. Pedicel stout, 1–2 cm, densely glandular-hairy, sometimes tomentose; calyx lobes 5, ca. 2 mm, rounded or broadly triangular, margin glandular; corolla tubular-campanulate, white or creamy yellow to violet-rose, with greenish or purple flecks, 3–4 cm, 5 nectar pouches at base; lobes 5, orbicular, 2–2.5 × ca. 3 cm, emarginate; stamens 10, unequal, 2–3.5 cm, filaments pubescent at base; ovary conoid, 5–6 mm, 8–10-loculed, densely glandular-hairy; style sometimes glandular to the tip, stigma small. Capsule oblong-cylindric, 15–20 × 6–10 mm. Fl. Mar–May, fr. Sep–Oct.

Evergreen broad-leaved forests, mixed forests; 1700–3500 m. W Guizhou, SW Sichuan, N and SE Yunnan [N Vietnam].

Lower Taxa

• Rhododendron irroratum subsp. irroratum
• Rhododendron irroratum subsp. pogonostylum (I. B. Balfour & W. W. Smith) D. F. Chamberlain