Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Scandent vines, foliage with a spicy odor, new growth subtomentose.

Stems: Stems many-branched, densely villous.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Opposite. Blades oblong–lanceolate to oblong–elliptic, 2.5–10 cm long, 1.4–4.3 cm wide. Apex obtuse to rounded. Base cordate, occasionally shallowly so. Surfaces moderately villous and glandular–dotted; hairs on upper surfaces occasionally somewhat appressed. Margins coarsely crenate. Petioles 0.9–3 cm long, densely villous. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers (6–)8–12 per verticillaster, in unbranched, terminal, racemose inflorescences 8–15 cm long, pedicels 1–3 mm long, densely villous, bracts oblong–ovate, ovate, or occasionally upper ones reniform, 5–20 mm long, lowermost pair larger, 20–38 mm long. Calyx campanulate, 3.5–5 mm long, enlarging in fruit, villous and glandular–dotted, lobes oblong to broadly deltate, 1.5–2 mm long, villous and glandular–dotted on both faces, margins usually with 1 to few crenations, apex obtuse to rounded or occasionally subacute, splitting longitudinally, usually persistent or sometimes only ventral 1/2 persistent. Corolla bilabiate, white, tube narrowly funnelform, ca. 7–10 mm long, villous and glandular–dotted, upper Iip ca. 2–2.5 mm long entire or 2-lobed, flat or concave, villous, lower lip ca. 4–5 mm long, 3-lobed, lateral lobes ovate, slightly asymmetrical, lower lobe broadly ovate to suborbicular, slightly folded to form a groove, margins somewhat undulate, apex emarginate or entire; nectary disk often present at base of ovary, annular or developed on anterior side only. Stamens 4, both pairs of similar length or upper pair slightly longer, ascending the upper corolla lip, included, aligned with the sinuses; filaments inserted near throat, usually pubescent; anthers dithecal, opening by longitudinal slits; anther sacs divaricate. Ovary superior, 2-carpellate, placentation basal-axile; ovules 1 per ovary lobe; style 1, included, arising between lobes, shortly 2-lobed, the lobes clavate; stigmatic only at apex, 1 lobe often rudimentary; stigmas 2.

Fruit: Nutlets ca. 1.5–2 mm long; 1-seeded; dark green to black; drupaceous; exocarp fleshy; obovoid; margins slightly winged; obliquely attached at the connate base; spreading and exserted from calyx at maturity. Seeds with endosperm absent or scanty and oily.

Ploidy:

Habitat: Rare in mesic to wet forest; on windward slopes.

Elevation Range: 700–1,650 m.