Castanopsis chinensis (Spreng.) Hance

Trees 10-20 m tall; branches and leaf blades glabrous. Petiole 1.5-2 cm; leaf blade lanceolate to rarely ovate, 7-18 × 2-5 cm, thickly papery to nearly leathery, concolorous, base rounded to acute, margin at least from middle to apex serrate, apex caudate; midvein and secondary veins adaxially raised; secondary veins 9-12 on each side of midvein. Female inflorescences borne on apical part of 1st-year branchlets; flowers 1 per cupule. Infructescences 8-15 cm. Cupule globose, 2.5-3.5 cm in diam., usually splitting into 3-5 segments, outside densely grayish brown puberulent when young but glabrescent, inside densely brown villous, wall 1-1.5 mm thick; bracts spinelike, almost entirely covering outside cupule, 6-12 mm, connate into bundles from base to nearly middle. Nut conical, 1.2-1.6 × 1-1.3 cm, glabrous or rarely puberulent from middle to apex; scar basal, 8-10 mm in diam. Fl. May-Jul, fr. Sep-Nov of following year.

Guangdong, Guangxi, SW Guizhou, Hunan, SE Yunnan [Vietnam]

Mixed and broad-leaved evergreen forests; below 1500 m.

Castanea chinensis Sprengel, Syst. Veg. 3: 856. 1826; Castanopsis remotiserrata Hu.