海南染木树 hai nan ran mu shu

Erect shrubs, 1-2 m tall; branches weakly flattened to terete, glabrous, with epidermis often becoming hardened then fragmenting. Leaves opposite or sometimes appearing whorled due to congested nodes with internodes not expanded, sometimes in unequal pairs; petiole 1-3 mm, glabrous; blade drying membranous to papery, oblong-ovate to oblong-elliptic, 3.5-15 × 1.5-5.5 cm, adaxially glabrous, abaxially glabrous or hirtellous on principal veins, base rounded to cuneate, apex acute or shortly acuminate; secondary veins 7-12 pairs, usually joining in a submarginal vein, usually with pilosulous or foveolate domatia; stipules caducous, ovate, 2-3 mm, glabrous, aristate with bristle 1-3 mm. Inflorescences terminal and in uppermost leaf axils, glomerulate or capitate, few flowered, glabrous; bracts ovate, usually fused in pairs, 1-2 mm. Flowers sessile. Calyx glabrous; hypanthium portion obconic, 1-2 mm; limb 1-2 mm, lobed for ca. 1/2; lobes 4(-6), triangular. Corolla tubular, glabrous or puberulent outside; tube ca. 3 mm, in throat villous; lobes 4, elliptic to elliptic-ovate, ca. 2.5 mm. Drupes obovoid, 6-7 × 3-4 mm; pyrenes plano-convex, smooth abaxially. Fl. Jun, fr. Oct-Nov.

● Ravines; 300-1700 m. Hainan.

H. S. Lo (in FRPS 71(2): 67. 1999) described the calyx lobes as 5 or 6, but they are consistently 4 on the specimens studied.