Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Erect shrubs 2–3 m tall.

Stems: Uppermost branches rounded, covered with spreading, plumose, brown hairs.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Opposite, decussate. Somewhat unequal in each pair, elliptic, elliptic–oblong, or elliptic–lanceolate, 7–18 cm long, 2.5–9 cm wide. Apex acute to acuminate. Base of larger leaves rounded to subauriculate. Upper surfaces essentially glabrous at maturity; lower surfaces covered with spreading, plumose hairs. Margins entire. Pinnately veined with 3–4 pairs of primary veins diverging from the central vein at successive points above base of blade. Petioles 5–40 mm long. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers in inflorescences 8–11 cm long (incl. peduncle), pedicels 6–8 mm long in fruit, bracts and bracteoles ovate to elliptic–ovate or lanceolate, 5–15 mm long, 2–8(–14) mm wide, 3–5–nerved, deciduous. Flowers bisexual (perfect). Hypanthium ca. 4 mm long, moderately to densely stellate pubescent. Calyx truncate, lobes 4, erect, broadly rounded, ca. 2 mm long. Corolla of 4 petals, pink, obliquely obovate, 9–11 mm long, 5–6 mm wide at apex. Stamens 8, ± equal; filaments 4.5–5 mm long; anthers 3.5–4 mm long, opening by a pore, the truncate dorsal spur ca. 0.25 mm long, deflexed, the ventral appendages ca. 1 mm long. Ovary inferior, densely bristly at summit, 4–6-celled; ovules numerous, placentation axile; style simple; stigma terminal.

Fruit: Berries subglobose; crowned by persistent calyx lobes; berries reportedly white at maturity; 4–celled; 5–7 mm long. Seeds papillose; ca. 0.5 mm long; endosperm absent.

Ploidy:

Habitat: Wet coastal forests.

Elevation Range: