Botanical Name / Rhododendron arboreum subsp. zeylanicum (Booth) Tagg

Small to moderate-sized tree, to c. 20 m tall. Trunk stout, usually twisted, thickened at base. Bark thick, dark grey, deeply furrowed. Root system shallow, running a few cm below soil surface. Young shoots densely tomentose; buds covered with bud scales. Leaf- and scale-scars prominent, leaf-scars more or less heart-shaped. Leaves thick and very stiff, crowded at the ends of twigs, 7-14 x 3-8 cm, elliptic to ovate, blunt to acute at apex, tapering or somewhat rounded at base, with margins strongly recurved, glabrous above, bullate, more or less densely covered with a thin, close felt of white or brown shiny dendroid scales beneath; midrib depressed above along its entire length, with 12-16 secondary veins on either side, impressed above, prominent beneath. Petiole 1-3 cm long, to c. 4.5 mm thick, narrowly channelled above, tomentose. Raceme short, dense and more or less head-like, with to c. 25 flowers. Peduncle 5-10 mm long. Scales densely covered with appressed silky hairs on back, outer ones broadly ovate or orbicular, c. 1 cm long, abruptly subulate in the upper half, inner 1-3 cm x 6-15 mm, obovate to linear, apiculate. Pedicel c. 1.5 cm long, reddish, glandular-pubescent. Bracteoles c. 10 mm long, filiform, white, pubescent, at the base of the pedicel. Sepals to c. 2 mm long, imbricate, rounded, reddish, glandular pubescent. Corolla cherry-coloured, tube 2-3 cm long, 1.5-2.5 cm broad, broadening distally, coriaceous, with small black spots within on posterior side at the throat and nectar pouches and black splotches at the base, and clearly marked veins; lobes imbricate, 2-10 mm long, c. 15 mm broad, rounded, emarginate and 2-lobed, undulate. Stamens included, unequal, the anterior 5 longer than the posterior. Filaments 2.5- 3.5 cm, attached to the floral axis, glabrous, dilated below, white, red at base, with 2 bulges on abaxial side at base, connective with a depression at back. Anthers 2.5 - 4 mm long, orange-brown, dorsifixed, dehiscing by 2 apparently terminal subcircular pores. Ovary with 10 vertical ridges, of 10 carpels and 10 loculi, densely silky pubescent. Ovules more or less pendulous. Style 2.5-4 cm, glabrous, slightly curved, pale green below, red distally, the colour deepening at apex. Stigma oblong, c. 3x2 mm, dark red-black, with lobes bent over and the centre hollowed, sticky. Capsule 1.5-3 cm long, c. 6 mm broad, often tipped with the persistent style. Seeds c. 1.5 mm long, brown. (FOC)

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