头序荛花 tou xu rao hua

Daphne capitata (Rehder) Halda.

Shrubs 0.5-1 m tall. Branches green, usually turning purple-brown in first year, terete, slender, glabrous. Leaves opposite or subopposite; petiole 0.5-1.5 mm; leaf blade dull yellowish green adaxially, paler abaxially, elliptic or obovate-elliptic, rarely obovate-oblong, 1-2 × 0.4-1 cm, membranous, both surfaces glabrous or sparsely strigose and glabrescent, base gradually narrowed, apex obtuse or slightly obtuse; lateral veins 5-7 pairs, oblique, slightly curved upward, raised abaxially. Inflorescences terminal, capitate, 3-7-flowered; peduncle 1-2 cm, very slender. Pedicel absent. Calyx yellow, 7-8 × ca. 1 mm, exterior sericeous-strigose; lobes 4, ovate or ovate-oblong, ca. 1.5 × 1 mm. Stamens 8, lower whorl inserted above middle of calyx tube, upper whorl at throat; filaments short; anthers ovoid-oblong, 0.8-1 mm. Disk scale 1, linear, ca. 1 mm, apex 2- or 3-dentate. Ovary ca. 3 mm, strigose-pubescent; style very short, ca. 0.5 mm; stigma purple, capitate. Drupe yellow or orange, ovoid-globose, ca. 5 mm, slightly strigose, tapering at both ends, enclosed by persistent calyx. Fl. summer-autumn.

● Forests, exposed shrubby slopes; 300-1000 m. Guizhou, Hubei, Shanxi, Sichuan.