贵州连蕊茶 gui zhou lian rui cha

Camellia dubia Sealy; C. subacutissima Hung T. Chang; Thea costei (H. Léveillé) Rehder.

Shrubs or trees, 1.5-5(-8) m tall. Young branches grayish brown, slender; year-old branchlets glabrous or glabrescent; current year branchlets grayish yellow shortly pubescent. Petiole 2-5 mm, pubescent; leaf blade elliptic to oblong-elliptic, 5-8 × 1.5-3.5 cm, papery to thinly leathery, abaxially pale green and strigose or glabrescent, adaxially dark green, slightly shiny, and hirtellous along midvein, midvein raised on both surfaces, secondary veins 6-8 on each side of midvein, abaxially slightly raised, and adaxially visible, base cuneate, broadly cuneate, or obtuse, margin serrulate to crenulate-serrulate, apex bluntly acuminate to caudate. Flowers axillary, solitary. Pedicel 2-5 mm, elongating in fruit, pubescent; bracteoles 4 or 5, semiorbicular to triangular-ovate, 0.5-1.5 mm, outside apically densely pubescent, margin ciliolate. Calyx cupular, 3-4.5 mm; lobes triangular-ovate to ovate, 1.5-3 mm, outside apically densely pubescent, inside glabrous, margin ciliolate. Petals 5(-7), white or pale purplish red in bud, obovate to broadly obovate, 1-2.5 cm, basally connate for 3-5 mm, apex emarginate. Stamens 1.2-1.8 cm, glabrous; outer filament whorl basally connate into fleshy tube for (4-)5-9 mm. Ovary ovoid, ca. 1 mm, glabrous; style 1-1.7 cm, apically 3-lobed, lobes ca. 0.5 mm. Capsule subglobose, 1-1.5 cm in diam., 1-loculed with 1 seed; pericarp green to purplish red, leathery, becoming dark brown and crustaceous when dry. Seed chestnut brown, subglobose, 0.9-1.3 cm in diam., smooth. Fl. Feb-Mar, fr. Sep-Oct. 2n = 30*.

● Forests, thickets; 400-1500(-2000) m. N Guangxi, Guizhou, W Hubei, W Hunan, E and W Sichuan, NE and SE Yunnan.