版纳龙船花 ban na long chuan hua

Shrubs, to 2 m tall; branches glabrous, lenticellate, striate. Leaves opposite; petiole 1-1.5 cm; blade drying thickly papery, opaque, dark green, oblong-lanceolate, 10-16 × 3-4.5 cm, base obtuse, apex cuneate, acute, or acuminate; secondary veins 14-16 pairs; stipules triangular, ca. 10 mm, acute with arista ca. 3 mm. Inflorescence terminal, corymbiform-cymose, 8-9 × 9-10 cm, puberulent; peduncle 0.1-0.5 cm; bracts linear-lanceolate to linear, 3-5 mm. Flowers sessile to subsessile. Calyx puberulent; hypanthium turbinate, ca. 2 mm; limb deeply lobed; lobes broadly triangular, ca. 1 mm, obtuse. Corolla red, outside glabrous; tube ca. 10 mm, glabrous inside; lobes narrowly oblong, 4-5 mm, obtuse to subrounded. Drupe unknown. Fl. Apr-Jun.

● Sparse forests on gentle hill slopes. Yunnan (Xishuangbanna).

This name was originally published with the spelling "paraopara," a correctable typographical error as evidenced by the diagnosis, which states that this new species is related to Ixora opaca R. Brown ex G. Don. The protologue text described the corolla tube as 1 mm long, but this seems to be shown as 1 cm in the protologue figure.