Description

Erect branching tree to 5m. Twigs 3–5mm in diameter, rounded, densely stellately scaly, glabrescent on older parts; internodes 3–8cm. Leaves 4–5 together in pseudowhorls. Blade 40–100 x 25–40mm, broadly elliptic, or slightly obovate; apex shortly acuminate, apiculate; margin flat or slightly revolute; base broadly tapering or rounded to slightly sub-cordate, immature ones densely brown-scaly with fragile scales and early glabrescent, leaving the leaves rough with the persistent tubercles above; covered for a longer time beneath with a nearly woolly scaly covering but later leaving the undersurface also rough. Scales large, narrowly stellately divided to form dendroid, stellate hairs, each on top of an epidermal tubercle. Mid-vein flat or minutely impressed above, as wide as the petiole and very prominent proximally, gradually less so distally beneath; lateral veins 4–8 per side, at an acute angle, straight below, curved and anastomosing before the margin, forming a lax network with the veins, with indistinct reticulation above but very distinctly so below. Petiole 10–17 x 1.5–2mm, grooved above, densely scaly. Bracts 15–22 x 8–10mm; the outer bracts ovate, sub-obtuse; the inner ones spathulate, both densely hairy on both sides, or minutely hairy or even glabrous. Bracteoles 10–15 x 1–2mm, linear to very narrowly spathulate, laxly to densely patently hairy. Inflorescence a 3–8-flowered, open umbel, the flowers horizontal to half-hanging. Pedicels 8–15 x 1–2mm, densely brown, stellately scaly, but without hairs except immediately below the calyx. Calyx deeply divided into irregular triangular lobes, to 2mm, densely, shortly-hairy and scaly outside and often with a longer fringe of hairs. Corolla 40–65 x 30–40mm, tubular, zygomorphic, bright red; tube 30–45 x 6–8 x 10–15mm, very laxly scaly or glabrous outside, with patent or retrorse hairs inside, straight below, curved and gradually dilated upwards; lobes 12–20 x 10–16mm, semi-erect or spreading, irregular, the upper two much larger than the lower three, obovate-spathulate, sometimes nearly circular. Stamens exserted to 8mm, unequal, irregularly arranged all round the mouth; the filaments red, linear and densely patently hairy proximally below, gradually less so distally becoming completely glabrous for 6–10mm; anthers 2–5 x 1–1.25mm, elongate-oblong, the base obtuse. Disc glabrous at least at the base. Ovary 8–10 x 2.5–3mm, elongate-cylindrical, gradually tapering distally, very densely hairy in the lowest 1mm (which may be the upper margin of the disc), elsewhere densely brown-scaly and hairy with the scales more numerous than the hairs and clearly visible; style as long or a little longer than the corolla tube, laxly hairy and sparsely scaly in the lower 1⁄3–2⁄3, glabrous distally; stigma thickly conical-sub-globose. Fruit 30–35 x c.6mm, fusiform, densely brown hairy and scaly. Seeds filiform, 3–4mm, with a very narrow tail at both ends.

Distribution

Papua New Guinea, Wharton and Owen Stanley Ranges, Mt Piora, Mt Victoria, Mt Amorwange, Mt Scratchley.

Altitude

Habitat

In forests, usually as part of the understory in closed canopy stands of moss forests or more rarely along the margins of alpine grasslands, said to be common at the Murray Pass (Wharton Range).

Nomenclatural History

Notes

References

Argent, G. (2006) Rhododendrons of subgenus Vireya. RHS:London. Page:98