台湾耳草 tai wan er cao

Herbs, erect, annual, to 20 cm tall; stems terete to 4-angled, hirsute. Leaves sessile; blade drying papery, elliptic-oblong, oblanceolate, ovate-lanceolate, or lanceolate, 1.5-6 × 0.3-1 cm, adaxially puberulent to scaberulous, abaxially densely villous to hirsute, base cuneate to attenuate, apex acute to acuminate; stipules broadly triangular, ca. 3 mm, hirsute, acuminate. Inflorescences terminal and/or axillary, capitate or glomerulate; bracts linear, to 1.5 mm. Flowers sessile. Calyx hirsute; hypanthium portion ovoid, ca. 1.5 mm; lobes linear to deltoid, ca. 1.5 mm. Corolla white, funnelform, pubescent inside and out; tube 0.8-2.3 mm; lobes oblong-linear, ca. 0.2 mm. Anthers exserted. Fruit indehiscent or dehiscent across top, subglobose, somewhat compressed laterally, 1.5-2 mm in diam.; seeds numerous, angled. Fl. Jul-Sep.

● Taiwan (Yilan).

This species is poorly known, and the available descriptions are limited. It is included in the key to species twice, for the described hirsute stems and the potentially glabrous stems, a condition eventually found in most pubescent species of Hedyotis (and other Rubiaceae) and one that can be confirmed as more specimens become available.