泡火绳 pao huo sheng

Trees, to 6 m tall. Branchlets stellate tomentose when young, hairs soon sparse. Stipules very quickly lost; petiole ca. 4.5 cm, stellate velutinous; leaf blade orbicular-ovate, sometimes obscurely 3-lobed, to ca. 16 × 14 cm, thickly papery, abaxially stellate tomentose, adaxially stellate puberulent, basal veins 7, base cordate, margin very shallowly obtusely dentate, apex acuminate to acute. Infructescence terminal, to 6 cm, few-fruited; peduncle robust, glabrescent. Fruiting pedicel ca. 15 mm; epicalyx lobes ovate, ca. 1/2 as long as sepals, densely woolly stellate pilose, margins deeply fimbriate. Sepals 5, linear-lanceolate, ca. 3 cm. Petals 5, obcordate, ca. 2/3 as long as sepals, apex emarginate. Staminal tube as long as petals. Ovary 5-locular; style puberulent, stigma lobes very short. Capsule cylindrical, ca. 3 × 2.5 cm, each valve with prominent verrucose keel, grooved between valves, apex shortly beaked, valves 8-10, adaxial margin conspicuously woolly pilose. Seeds ca. 10 per locule, arranged in 2 lines, ca. 1.5 cm including wing.

1300-1400 m. Yunnan [India, Nepal].

Eriolaena wallichii is known in the Flora area from just the one fruiting gathering, A. Henry 12506A, and flowering material is needed to confirm the identification. Flowering material has extremely distinctive very woolly fimbriate epicalyx lobes.