柃叶连蕊茶 ling ye lian rui cha

Shrubs or rarely trees, 1-4(-6) m tall. Older branches purplish brown, glabrous; young branches reddish brown, sparsely pubescent; current year branchlets slender, densely grayish yellow pubescent. Petiole 1-3 mm, pubescent; leaf blade elliptic, elliptic-ovate, or lanceolate, 2-4.7 × 0.8-2 cm, thinly leathery, abaxially pale green and sparsely appressed villous or glabrescent, adaxially dark green and hirtellous along midvein, midvein ± raised on both surfaces, secondary veins 5-7 on each side of midvein and obscure on both surfaces, base cuneate to broadly cuneate, margin serrulate, apex bluntly acuminate. Flowers axillary or subterminal, solitary, ca. 1.5 cm in diam. Pedicel 4-10 mm, elongating to 1.5 cm in fruit, slender, glabrous, thickened toward apex; bracteoles (3 or)4 or 5, not covering pedicel, triangular to broadly ovate, 0.5-1.5 mm, outside puberulent near apex, margin ciliolate. Calyx shallowly cupular, 2-2.5 mm; lobes 5, broadly ovate to semiorbicular, 1-1.5 mm, outside puberulent near apex, inside sericeous, margin ciliolate. Petals 5, white, obovate to broadly obovate, 1-1.8 cm, basally connate for 3-5 mm, apex emarginate to truncate. Stamens 0.9-1.5 cm, glabrous or villous; outer filament whorl basally connate for 3-9 mm into a cup. Ovary ovoid, 1.5-2 mm, glabrous; style 1-1.9 cm, apically 3-parted for ca. 1 mm. Capsule subglobose, 1-1.5 cm in diam., 1-loculed with l seed; pericarp green to brown, thinly leathery. Seed brown, globose, ca. 1 cm in diam. Fl. Mar-May, fr. Aug-Oct.

● Forests, thickets; 300-1500 m. Fujian, N Guangdong, SE Hunan, Jiangxi, Sichuan, Taiwan.