落叶木莲 luo ye mu lian

Magnolia decidua (Q. Y. Zheng) V. S. Kumar; Sinomanglietia glauca Z. X. Yu & Q. Y. Zheng.

Trees, deciduous, to 15 m tall, to 45 cm d.b.h. Bark grayish white. Twigs purple, smooth, scattered with white suborbicular lenticels; vegetative buds subglabrous. Stipular scar 1/4-1/2 as long as petiole. Leaves often clustered on apex of branches; petiole 2.5-4.5(-6) cm; leaf blade narrowly obovate, narrowly elliptic, or elliptic, ca. 20 × 3.5-7 cm, papery, abaxially with gray and white trichomes but later glabrescent, adaxially dark green and smooth, midvein adaxially slightly impressed, secondary veins 9-12 on each side of midvein, base cuneate, margin slightly revolute, apex obtuse to shortly acute. Flower buds narrowly ovoid, subtended by a spathaceous bract. Peduncle ca. 1 cm, at first with trichomes but later glabrescent. Tepals 15 or 16, in 5 or 6 whorls, pale yellow, lanceolate to narrowly obovate, becoming shorter and narrower inward, glabrous; outer 3 tepals 7-7.4 × 1.8-2 cm; innermost 3 or 4 tepals 5.5-6 × 0.3-0.8 cm. Stamens 54-60, 6-7 mm; filaments ca. 1 mm; connective exserted and forming a ca. 1 mm triangular mucro; anthers 4-5 mm. Gynoecium sessile, long ovoid, ca. 1 cm; carpels 15-22; ovules 6-8 per carpel. Fruiting peduncle ca. 1.6 cm. Fruit reddish brown when fresh but pale brown when dry, ovoid to subglobose, 4.7-7 × 4-4.5 cm; mature carpels long ovoid to long ellipsoid, 1.5-3 × 1-1.7 × 0.3-0.7 cm, woody, dehiscing along ventral sutures first then along dorsal suture. Seeds nearly cordate to subglobose, 7-11 × 7-11 × 5-8 mm; testa red. Fl. May, fr. Sep-Oct.

● Bamboo forests; 400-700 m. Jiangxi (Yichun).