Zhejiang Nan
Zhejiang Nan (phoebe chekiangensis) is a national second-class protected species and a precious timber tree species unique to East China. The trunk is straight, the material is hard, and it can be used as a material for construction, furniture and so on. The tree is tall, thick branches, obliquely extended, majestic, and the leaves are verdant in all seasons, which can be used as a green tree species.
Large tree with a straight trunk, up to 20 m tall and a chest diameter of 50 cm; the bark is pale brownish yellow, flaky and shedding, with obvious brown skin holes. The twigs are ridged and densely covered with yellow-brown or gray-black soft hairs or fluff. Leaf leathery, inverted ovate oval or inverted ovate lanceolate, rarely lanceolate, 7–17 cm long, 3–7 cm wide, usually 8–13 cm long and 3.5–5 cm wide, apex with tapering or long tapering tips, wedge-shaped or nearly rounded at the base, initially hairy above, glabrous or completely hairless on the top, gray-brown soft hairs below, long soft hairs on the veins, sagging above the middle and lateral veins, 8–10 lateral veins on each side, many and dense transverse veins, and conspicuous below; petioles 1–1.5 cm long, densely covered with yellowish-brown villi or soft hairs. The conical inflorescence is 5–10 cm long and densely covered with yellowish-brown villi; the flowers are about 4 mm long and the peduncle is 2–3 mm long; the indumental is ovate, both sides are hairy, the first and second rounds of filigree are sparsely covered with long gray-white soft hairs, the third round is densely covered with long gray-white soft hairs, the vestiges are arrow-shaped, indumentum; the ovary is ovate, hairless, the flower column is thin, straight or curved, and the stigma is disc-shaped. The fruit is oval-ovate, 1.2–1.5 cm long, covered with white powder on the outside when ripe; The seeds are unequal on both sides and are polyembryonic. The flowering period is from April to May, and the fruit period is from September to October.
It is found in northwest and northeast Zhejiang, northern Fujian and eastern Jiangxi. It grows in montane broad-leaved forests and is also cultivated.
Silver hazel
Tree, up to 8 m tall, chest diameter up to 40 cm. The trunk is twisted, uneven, and the bark is irregularly flake-like. There are often large hard galls. Bare buds, covered with brown villi. Single-leaf alternate; papery, broadly inverted ovate, blunt at the apex, rounded, truncated or slightly heart-shaped at the base, blunt serrations above the middle of the edge, and stellate hairs on both sides and petioles. Cephalic inflorescences are axillary or apical, with small, amphoteric flowers, open first leaves, no petals, and slender, drooping filaments in the stamens. The capsule is nearly rounded and densely covered with stellate hairs. The seeds are spindle-shaped and shiny. The flowering period is April and the fruiting period is from September to October.
At present, it is naturally distributed in the northern part of Tianmu Mountain and the southeast of Dabie Mountain, the distribution area of the existing population is extremely narrow, it is distributed intermittently, the number of individual populations is extremely rare, and in 1999, it was listed as a wild plant under national level I key protection, and was listed as a critically endangered, cr species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). As a tertiary relict plant, silver hazel is of great scientific value for exploring the early origin and differentiation of witch hazel in China.
The discovery and naming of the witch hazel has undergone a tortuous process:
As early as September 1935, Shen Jun, a botanist at Nanjing Zhongshan Botanical Garden, collected plant specimens in the limestone mountain of Furong Temple in Yixing, Jiangsu Province, which was full of branches and fruits, like witch hazel, but it was different, after collecting a specimen, it was ready for identification, and the research work was interrupted due to the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War and the Liberation War, and this precious specimen was sealed in the laboratory. Until 1954, when Professor Hua of the former Zhongshan Institute of Botany cleaned up the specimen, he believed that this tree species was a member of the witch hazel population, similar to the Japanese witch hazel, but could not confirm, and then pointed out that the specimen was of great importance. In 1960, the specimen was mistaken for witch hazel of the family Witch Hazel, leading to the misunderstanding of this major scientific discovery. In 1987, when the state compiled the "Red Book" of rare and endangered plants, scientific and technological personnel went to Yixing again and finally found physical specimens in the same type of limestone mountainous land. In the subsequent phenological observation, it was unexpectedly found that the flower vessel of this tree species has no petals, it is not witch hazel, it is a petalless type tree species in the witch hazel family, and its morphological characteristics are consistent with the North American witch hazel family of Fugit plants, but it is different from the plants of the family, and it is a new genus of new species. In 1992, it was named by the botanist Professor Zhu De: Silver hamamelis of the genus Virginiat of the Hamamelis family. Since then, the misprint of the small-leaf witch hazel in the Flora of China has been rewritten, and an ancient fossil tree species in the angiosperm has been re-emerged and known to the world.
The scientific and technological personnel of Hangzhou Botanical Garden have carried out research on the key technologies and demonstrations of silver hazel propagation, mainly including the research on the breeding technology of silver hazel cuttings, the research on the grafting and breeding technology of silver hazel anvil, the screening of excellent asexual lines of silver hazel, the fingerprint construction and molecular identification technology of excellent asexual lines of witch hazel, the research of biological and seed breeding technology of witch hazel breeding, and the production and demonstration of silver hazel seedlings.