Carlemannia tetragona - Tetragonal Carlemannia

Tetragonal Carlemannia is a perennial herb, 0.5-1.5 m tall, fragrant when dry. Flowers are white except yellow speckled in throat, shorter than 1 cm, outside hairy, inside hairy. Sepals are linear, 1-2 mm, flower-stalk 1-2.5 mm. Flowers are borne in corymb-like cymes, 2-4 cm, velvet-hairy; flower-cluster-stalks and branches slender; bracts linear, 2-2.5 mm, tip blunt. Stems are often with lower part prostrate and rooting at nodes; young branches four-edged, grooved, velvet-hairy or nearly hairless; old branches round, hairless. Leaf-stalks are 2-4 cm or slightly longer, finely velvet-hairy; leaf blade elliptic or ovate, often inequilateral, 3-10 x 2-5 cm, drying thinly papery or membranous, lateral veins 4-7 pairs, slender, both surfaces sparsely hairy, base shortly decurrent, margin distinctly sawtoothed, tip often with a tail. Capsule is broadly pyramidal, 3.5-4.5 mm in diameter, wider than long, base flat, tip contracted, star-shaped-splitting into 4 valves; valves with linear persistent sepals. Seeds reticular striped. Tetragonal Carlemannia is found in dense forests especially in moist ravines, at altitudes of 600-1500 m, in NE India, China and SE Asia. Flowering: June-October.