26. Lithocarpus pachyphyllus (Kurz) Rehder, J. Arnold Arbor. 1: 129. 1919.
厚叶柯 hou ye ke
Trees to 25 m tall. Young branchlets covered with lamellate, rust-colored, waxy scalelike trichomes, sulcate. Petiole 1.2-1.5 cm; leaf blade elliptic to ovate-elliptic, 10-20 × 4-7 cm, thinly or thickly leathery, abaxially dark red when young, glaucous with age, and with minute lamellate waxy scalelike trichomes, base broadly cuneate and ± decurrent on petiole, margin entire and usually emarginate, apex caudate with tip blunt to rounded; secondary veins 9-15 on each side of midvein, adaxially impressed, abruptly curving apically, fusing near margin. Male inflorescences solitary in axils of leaves or terminal panicles. Female inflorescences in clusters of 2 or 3, to 15 cm; cupules in clusters of 3-5. Infructescences 3-6 mm. Cupule cupular, 0.5-2.5 × 1.5-4.6 cm, variable in size, enclosing most of nut or sometimes only 1/3-1/2 when mature, wall 2-4 mm thick; bracts fused with cupule and reduced to scars or triangular, irregularly multilateral, with rust-colored, lamellate, waxy scalelike trichomes. Nut depressed globose, 1.2-2 × 1.5-3 cm, glabrous, apex rounded to slightly pointed, wall 1-1.2 mm thick; scar 1.2-1.5 cm in diam., convex with impressed margin. Fl. May-Jun, fr. Aug-Sep of following year.
Broad-leaved evergreen and mixed forests, mixed mesophytic forests; 800-2000(-3200) m. SE Xizang, SW Yunnan [Bhutan, NE India, NE Myanmar, Nepal, Sikkim]
The two varieties are not very distinct and could be treated as a single species.
