Chinese osbeckia (Osbeckia chinensis)

Chinese osbeckia (Osbeckia chinensis) is a plant species in Melastomatoideae, herbaceous or shrub, erect, 20-100 cm high, erect, stems 4 angles, pressed strigose, green, white-haired, growing in meadows, open slopes, roads footpath and elevation up to 2800 meters.

O. chinensis has leaves with very short stalks or up to 1 cm and strigose. Leaf blade linear, linear-lanceolate, oblong-ovate, elliptic-ovate and sometimes ovate-lanceolate.

2-5 cm long, 0.3-1 cm wide, stiff, both surfaces strigose, 3 secondary veins, tertiary veins inconspicuous, base blunt, subrounded, rounded, or subcordate, entire margin, apex acute.

Terminal inflorescence, head-shaped, 2-8 items with 2-6 bracteal leaves at base. Bracts are sessile, ovate, pubescent or adaxially glabrous. Hypanthium usually bright red, 6-6.5 mm, glabrous or 1-5 tuberculate tubercles.

Calyx lobes 4-5, triangular-lanceolate, margin ciliate, setose between lobes. Calyx 4-5, bright red to pale purple, ovoid, 1-1.5x1.3 cm, margin ciliated, apex apical or rounded.

Stamens 8 or 10 and tilted to one side. Filaments along the anthers. The lanceolate anthers are narrow and have a beak. Ovarian subglobose, 4-5 celled, dense apex setose or strigose. Capsule purplish red, ovoid, 6x4 mm, tuberculate glabrous or setiform.

Kingdom: Plantae
Phylum: Tracheophyta
Subphylum: Angiospermae
Class: Magnoliopsida
Order: Myrtales
Family: Melastomataceae
Subfamily: Melastomatoideae
Tribe: Melastomeae
Genus: Osbeckia
Species: Osbeckia chinensis

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