Polygala arillata
Content
Description
Erect, dichotomously branched shrub or small tree, 1.5-6 m high.
Leaves oblong to ovate-lanceolate, 5-20 by 1.5-8 cm, cuspidate, base attenuate to obtuse, thinly hairy to glabrous, beneath somewhat glaucescent, up to 1.5 cm petioled.
Flowers 11-20 mm long, yellow, turning orange and red, on 2-7(-9) mm long pedicels.
Sepals rounded, ciliate, alae obovate.
Ovary orbicular, sometimes ciliate;
Capsule ± orbicular or somewhat asymmetric, 8-10 by 12-15 mm winged, with prominent concentric ribs, coriaceous, glabrous.
Seeds globular, at micro-pylar side with a distinct appendage, black, glabrous or sparsely hairy up to halfway covered by an irregularly lobed and apically rather strongly projecting aril, the little protruding chalaza and the raphe distinctly visible.
Distribution
Asia-Tropical: East Himalaya (Bhutan present); India present; Philippines (Philippines present); Sri Lanka (Sri Lanka present); Thailand (Thailand present), Burma present, Nepal present, Palawan present, S. China present
India and Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, S. China, Hongkong, Burma, Thailand, Indochina; in Malesia: Philippines (Palawan; see HANSEN, l.c.).
Notes
Polygala trichocolpa CHODAT with about the same distribution (but not yet found in Malesia) differs in the branched inflorescence and in the typical, galeate (helm-shaped) aril. Polygala karensium KURZ, from Burma to Vietnam and Yunnan, differs in the geniculate style which is nearly recurved in the apical half and is strongly thickened subapically, and in the unribbed capsule.
Citation
KITAMURA 1955: Fl. Pl. Nepal Himal.: 170
KANJILAL & DAS 1935 – In: Fl. Assam: 87
KANAI 1966: Fl. E. Himal.: 173
HAND.-MAZZ. 1933 – In: Symb. Sinc.: 633
CHODAT 1893 – In: Monogr.: 94
SMITINAND 1961 – In: Nat. Hist. Bull. Siam Soc.: 43
LAUENER 1965 – In: Not. R. Bot. Gard. Edinb.: 343
TRIMEN 1893 – In: Fl. Ceyl.: 79
Miq. 1858 – In: Fl. Ind. Bat.: 125
SMITI-NAND 1955 – In: Thai For. Bull.: 3
Wall. 1830 – In: Pl. As. Rar.: 100
GAGNEP. 1938: Fl. Gén. I.-C.: 231
KANAI 1968: Phot. Pl. E. Himal.: f. 138
MURATA 1973 – In: Acta Phyt. Geobot.: 116
KURZ 1877 – In: Fl. Burma: 79
FORBES & HEMSLEY 1886 – In: J. Linn. Soc.: 59
HARA 1979 – In: En. Fl. Pl. Nepal: 50
HANSEN C.S. 1967 – In: Dansk Bot. Ark.: 83
BENN. 1872 – In: Fl. Br. India: 200
BURK. 1910 – In: Rec. Bot. Surv. India: 98
MUKHERJEE 1961 – In: Bull. Bot. Soc. Beng.: 31
BANERJI 1953 – In: J. Bomb. Nat. Hist. Soc.: 555