Description

Deciduous shrub, to 2 m high, young branches puberulous and with glandular hairs. Leaves clustered at the end of short-growing shoots, or spaced along free-growing shoots; blade elliptic or ovate, c.20-60 x 10-26 mm, base rounded or cuneate, apex sub-acute, apiculate, or obtuse, sometimes slightly emarginate and mucronate, margin serrulate and sometimes finely ciliate, mid-rib puberulous above and below, veins on lower surface ciliate; petiole c.5-12 mm long, puberulous and glandular. Inflorescence buds lateral, 1-flowered, borne below the expanded leaves; bud-scales persistent; pedicel c.5-8 mm long, pubescent and glandular. Calyx lobes broadly rounded, c.2mm, ciliate outside and fringed with prominent glandular hairs. Corolla white with pink flush and rose-purple markings, rotate with a short wide tube and spreading lobes, c.20mm across. Stamens 5, unequal; the 2 upper short (c.7mm), erect with filaments densely pilose for most of their length, the 3 lower with longer filaments (c. 12 mm) almost glabrous or shortly pubescent at the base, spreading. Ovary subglobose, c.2mm long, setose and densely glandular; style glabrous. Capsule subglobose, c.4 x 4 mm, densely glandular.

Distribution

Japan (Kyushu, Shikoku Honshu)

Altitude

Habitat

Thickets and forests in mountainous localities.

Nomenclatural History

Notes

References

Philipson, W.R. & Philipson, M.N. (1986) A Revision of Rhododendron III. Subgenera Azaleastrum, Mumeazalea, Candidastrum and Therorhodion. Notes from the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh 44(1):17