Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Medium-sized trees 10–12 m tall.

Stems: New growth yellowish brown puberulent, gradually becoming glabrate.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Opposite. Blades oblong–elliptic, oblong–obovate, or occasionally suborbicular, 6–24 cm long, 4–12.5 cm wide. Upper surfaces glabrous; lower surfaces puberulent, becoming glabrate; blades, chartaceous to moderately coriaceous. Margins entire. Primary lateral veins usually 8–10 pairs, prominent, connected by an arched vein usually 3–9 mm from margin, venation pinnate, lateral veins connected by an arched submarginal vein, higher order venation forming a reticulate pattern. Petioles 20–45 mm long. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers 2–5 in slender, very sparsely puberulent, axillary cymes, peduncles somewhat flattened, 15–20 mm long, pedicels ca. 4 mm long, bracts small, opposite. Calyx of 4 sepals; sepals imbricate, pistillate flowers with sepals deltate, ca. 1.5 mm long, glabrate, staminate flowers with sepals deltate–ovate, ca. 3.5 mm long, glabrate. Corolla of 4 petals, valvate, pistillate flowers petals deltate, ca. 3 mm long, glabrate, staminate flowers petals deltate, ca. 6 mm long, glabrate. Stamens 8, in 2 whorls, distinct, reduced but always present in functionally pistillate flowers, staminate flowers nectary disk glabrous. Ovary superior (pistillate flowers), 4-celled and 4-lobed, glabrous, carpels connate, only slightly distinct at apex to almost entirely distinct; ovules 2 per cell, hemitropous, 1 ascending; style 1, ca. 1 mm long, terminating in 4 short stigmatic branches; staminate flowers ovary glabrous; style ca. 1 mm long.

Fruit: Capsules subcuboid; 12–14 mm long; up to 30 mm wide; carpels nearly completely connate or connate ca. ⅔ their length; often recurved; exocarp and endocarp glabrous. the carpels dehiscing along the upper suture; exocarp. Seeds 1–2 per carpel; 7–8 mm long. glossy black when ripe; crustaceous; ovoid; sometimes angled from compression; embryo straight in fleshy endosperm; radicle short; cotyledons compressed; ovate; putamen brown; warty.

Ploidy:

Habitat: Rare in mesic forest.

Elevation Range: ca. 1,220 m.