Reinwardtia 1960. 5: 170.
WFO ID: wfo-0000400450
IPNI ID: urn:lsid:ipni.org:names:332045-1
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Erect shrub to 2.5m. Twigs rounded, reddish and often whitish, when dry, smooth, tips laxly to densely covered with small, flat, sub-stellate scales; internodes 5–16cm, often with conspicuous broad hemispherical to rounded buds in the leaf axils. Leaves spiral, equally spaced along the branches. Blade 30–50 x 15–25mm, elliptic, broadly elliptic or sub-obovate; apex broadly obtuse or rounded, apiculate with a thick prominent gland; margin flat or weakly revolute, entire or minutely irregular to denticulate-crenulate and narrowly cartilaginous; base broadly tapering and somewhat decurrent, more rarely almost rounded, laxly scaly above but quickly glabrescent, the scales leaving minute pits, more persistently brown-scaly beneath. Scales small, sub-circular, variously sub-stellately lobed; centre small, slightly impressed. Mid-vein impressed above especially at the base and obtusely prominent beneath; lateral veins 6–8 per side, ascending at an angle of c.45°, slightly impressed above, raised or inconspicuous beneath, reticulation visible only beneath. Petiole 3–6 x 1.5–2mm, grooved above, flattened, scaly. Flower buds to 30 x 14mm, ovoid, smooth with the bracts fully appressed, green or flushed with purplish red. Bracts 20–30 x c.15mm, membranous, glabrous except for the fringe of scales on the margins, outer, ovate, obtuse or emarginate. Bracteoles c.20 x 1–1.5mm, linear, glabrous. Inflorescence 3–6-flowered, in an open or one-sided umbel, the flowers hanging vertically or sometimes half-hanging. Pedicels 20–25 x c.1.5mm, laxly sub-stellately scaly below, more densely so distally, without hairs. Calyx 4–5mm in diameter, very obliquely disc-shaped, shortly, obtusely, 5-lobed, scaly outside. Corolla 45–50 x 25–30mm, dull yellow or greenish-yellow with a strong red flush on the proximal ½ of the tube, without scent, narrowly funnel-shaped, fleshy, glabrous both in and outside; tube 30–38 x 6–7 x 10–15mm, almost straight; lobes 12–15 x 14–18mm, broadly rounded to ovate, spreading horizontally, overlapping to c.halfway. Stamens very unequal, loosely clustered on the lower side of the mouth, exserted to c.10mm; filaments linear, glabrous, pale yellow; anthers 2.5–3 x 1.3–1.5mm; cells obovoid and basally apiculate. Disc green, prominent, glabrous. Ovary c.5 x 2.5mm, sub-ovoid-cylindrical, very densely covered with silvery sub-circular or angled, flat scales, gradually tapering distally; style slender, laxly scaly proximally for up to 10mm, glabrous distally, exserted up to 15mm from the corolla; stigma thick-capitate, green. Fruit 15 x 6mm, obliquely fusiform-cylindrical.
Indonesia, New Guinea (W), near Lake Habbema and the Wamena R. on N slope of Mt Wilhelmina (Trichora).
Shrubby forest, or grassy margins of Podocarpus forest, or open shrubberies on ridges, locally plentiful
Argent, G. (2006) Rhododendrons of subgenus Vireya. RHS:London. Page:223