Rhododendron spinuliferum var. spinuliferum

Description with 25 photos. Photo: Finn Bertelsen. Up to a few meters high, straggly, evergreen shrub. Probably not hardy in our garden. Young shoots greenish and hairy. Petiole scaly, pubescent, with tapering, flat and curly marginal bristles, to 7 mm. Leaf blade elliptic to oblanceolate, with marginal hairs, to 9 cm. Leaf apex acuminate, acute or acute-obtuse, with mucro. Leaf base acute. Leaf adaxial side green, with fine hairs along the mid-rib, rugose, scaly with scattered tiny scales, 130 micrs., 3-5 x their diam. apart. Leaf margins with scattered bristles. Leaf abaxial side green, with raised, pubescent veins, scaly with scales 140-240 micrs, 1-3 x their diam. apart. Inflorescence an umbel with 2-4 flowers. More inflorescences may form a cluster. Pedicel scaly and pubescent. c. 10 mm. Calyx rimlike, scaly and densely hairy, small (3-4 mm in diam). Corolla with 5 lobes, tubular vase-shaped, upright, red, 16 mm . Stamens 10, initially not exserted from corolla. Style glabrous, green, exserted from corolla. Capsule barrel-shaped, densely puberulent and scaly, with 5 loculi, 8 mm. Seeds without wings and with tiny floating appendages, 0.9-1.1 mm. Locality of origin FB1-2018: Xichang county, Sichuan, China, 2400m. Native habitat: Sichuan, Yunnan, China at 1700-2600 m (Fang 1986, Sichuan Rh. China).