Schima khasiana
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'Schima khasiana' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
This is a finer species than S. argentea, from which it differs in its larger and relatively broader leaves 5 to 7 in. long, 13⁄8 to 23⁄4 in. wide, toothed at the margin, green beneath, and in the larger bracteoles on the pedicels, these being short and inconspicuous in S. argentea but 7⁄8 in. long and 3⁄8 in. wide in S. khasiana. The pedicels are also distinctly longer, being 15⁄8 to 35⁄8 in. long; in this respect the cultivated plant and many Chinese specimens differ also from typical S. khasiana. The flowers, at least on the cultivated plants, are larger than in S. argentea. Bot. Mag., n.s., t. 143.
S. khasiana was described from the Khasi Hills of Assam, whence it extends through Burma into N.W. Yunnan and the former Indo-China. It was introduced by Forrest, probably under number F. 26026, collected November 1924 on the Shweli-Salween divide at 8,000 ft (the plant at Caerhays is under F. 24630, which belongs to a flowering specimen collected the same year in June in the same locality). The flowering material portrayed in the Botanical Magazine was received in September from Trewithen, where there are two fine specimens, the larger 52 × 43⁄4 ft (1971). Cut in hard winters they soon break into growth again and produce fertile seed. The tree at Caerhays measures 30 × 23⁄4 ft (1971) [40 × 41⁄2 ft at 3 ft in 1984], and there is another fine example at Trengwainton. S. khasiana received an Award of Merit when exhibited from Caerhays on October 20, 1953.
