Mallotus japonicus.
Family Euphorbiaceae.
Deciduous shrubs or small trees up to 6 m high.
New stems and leaves are reddish and are covered in tiny, white, stellate hairs.
Mature, alternately arranged leaves are broadly ovate and up to 30 cm long.
They are occasionally 2-lobed.
The leaf base is rounded and the tip tapers to a long point.
Most or all of the downy hairs wear off.
Both leaf surfaces have many tiny translucent (pellucid) glands.
There are extrafloral nectaries on the leaf edges.
Plants have either male or female flowers.
Flowers are on erect, branched, densely hairy, terminal spikes around 15 cm long.
The white to yellowish flowers have up to 5 sepals but no petals.
Male flowers have up to 100 stamens.
Female flowers have a superior ovary of 3 carpels.
There is a short style and 3 curved stigmas.
The fruit are 3-chambered capsules.
J.F.
