Pauldopia ghorta - Pauldopia

Pauldopia is a shrub or small tree 1.5-2.5 m tall (can grow up to 6 m). The generic name is in the honour of Paul Louis Amans Dop (1876-1954), a French botanist who worked extensively in Indochina. Branchlets are copiously warty. Leaves are sparsely velvet-hairy, double-compound, about 38 cm long, with side-stalks narrowly winged. Leaflets are ovate-lanceshaped, 3-7.5 X 1.5-2.5 cm, base wedge-shaped, margin entire, fringed with hairs, tip long tapering. Flowers are borne in panicles or cymes at branch-ends, nodding, sometimes flowers densely clustered at flower-cluster-stalk tip, 8-12 cm; flower-cluster-stalk 15-20 cm. Flower-stalks are 1-2 cm, sparsely velvet-hairy. Calyx is about 1.5 cm, less than 1 cm in diameter, tip nearly flat. Flower lobes are semirounded, spreading, yellow or red-brown, about 1.5 cm, tube dark yellow, 3-6 cm, slightly curved. Filaments thread-like, 2-2.5 cm, hairless; anthers divergent, 2-celled, connective subulate. Style about 3 cm, smooth; stigma lingulate. Capsule long round, about 15-30 cm long, 5-8 mm in diameter, long tapering at both ends. Pauldopia is found in the Evergreen broad-leaved forests, roadsides, slopes, at altitudes of 600-1800 m in S Yunnan, NE India, Laos, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam. It is grown as an ornamental plant. Flowering: May-June.