大果核果茶 da guo he guo cha

Trees 5-15 m tall. Young branches yellowish brown to grayish brown; current year branchlets puberulent when young, soon glabrescent. Petiole 5-10 mm; leaf blade oblong, 16-18 × 4-7 cm, leathery, abaxially pale green, sparsely pubescent when young but soon glabrescent, and becoming yellowish brown when dry, adaxially green becoming yellowish green when dry, shiny, and glabrous, midvein abaxially elevated and adaxially impressed, secondary veins 12-16 on each side of midvein and raised on both surfaces, base cuneate, margin undulate-serrate, apex acuminate to bluntly acuminate. Flowers axillary or subterminal, solitary, 4-10 cm in diam. Pedicel 2-10 mm, pubescent; bracteoles 2, ovate to broadly ovate, 1-1.5 × 1.5-2 cm, outside densely yellow sericeous. Sepals 9-11, suborbicular, 2-3(-4) cm in diam., thickly leathery, outside yellowish sericeous, margin membranous, apex rounded to retuse. Petals 5 or 6, white, broadly obovate, 4-5 × 2-3 cm, outside yellowish sericeous, inside glabrous, margin membranous, apex emarginate. Stamens numerous, ca. 1.5 cm, glabrous; outer filament whorl basally slightly connate and adnate to petals. Ovary densely yellowish tomentose, 3-6-loculed with 2-5 ovules per locule; style 3-6, pubescent basally to middle, connate to near apex. Capsule globose to oblate, 2-8 cm in diam., 3-6-loculed with 2-5 seeds per locule, dehiscent from base; pericarp 1-5 mm thick when dry, woody, yellow tomentose; columella persistent. Seeds brown, oblong, laterally compressed, ca. 2.5 cm, shiny. Fl. May-Jun, fr. Aug-Oct. 2n = 30.

Evergreen broad-leaved forests; 300-1500 m. S Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, S Hunan, S Jiangxi [N Vietnam].