Ilex latifrons Chun

Trees evergreen, 4-27 m tall. Branchlets tetragonous, stout, longitudinally striate, densely ferruginous or dirty yellow villous; lenticels indistinct; leaf scars semicircular, slightly raised; terminal buds conical, densely dirty yellow villous. Petiole 1-1.3 cm, stout, densely villous, rounded abaxially, narrowly sulcate adaxially; leaf blade oblong or obovate, 9-22 × 3.5-10 cm, leathery to subleathery, abaxially crispate-villous or glabrescent, adaxially sparsely pubescent or glabrous, midvein raised and villous abaxially, densely dirty yellow pubescent adaxially, base rounded or subrounded, margin shallowly serrulate or subentire, apex acuminate. Inflorescences: cymes or compound cymes, solitary, axillary on current year’s branchlets. Male inflorescences: cymes of order 2-4; peduncles 1.5-2.8 cm, compressed, sparsely crispate-villous; secondary axis unequal, longer than pedicels; pedicels 1-2 mm, pubescent; flowers purple-red; calyx deeply 4-lobed, lobes ovate, outside sparsely puberulent; petals 4, oblong, ca. 1.5 × 1 mm, basally slightly connate, apex rounded; stamens 4, ca. 2/3 as long as petals, anthers elliptic; rudimentary ovary conical, minute, stigma distinct, slightly lobed. Female flowers not known. Infructescences: compound cymes; peduncles 1-2 cm, compressed, pubescent; fruiting pedicels 5-7 mm, pubescent. Fruit ellipsoidal-globose, 9-10 mm, 6-8 mm in diam., striate, sulcate; persistent calyx deeply 4- or 5-lobed, lobes deltoid, pilose, ciliate; persistent stigma discoid, flat, shallowly 4-lobed; pyrenes 4-6, ellipsoidal, abaxially deeply 1-sulcate, smooth. Fl. Jun, fr. Aug-Dec.

Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, SE Yunnan.

● Evergreen broad-leaved forests; 1200-1800 m.

Ilex kwangtungensis Merrill var. pilosissima Handel- Mazzetti; I. latifrons var. pilosissima (Handel-Mazzetti) Chun.