Choisy
Description
Hypericum oblongifolium is a shrubby St John's wort of the family Hypericaceae, native to the western and central Himalaya. GBIF records place it principally in India, Pakistan, Nepal and Afghanistan, with scattered records eastward to Bhutan and occurrences elsewhere representing cultivated plants. It grows on open, rocky hillsides, in scrub, along forest margins and on stream banks in the temperate zone, generally between about 1,500 and 3,000 m. The specimen illustrated from Maji in Garhwal, India, at around 2,650 m in June is typical of this sunny, well-drained mid-montane habitat where the shrub flowers in early summer.
The plant is a much-branched, evergreen to semi-evergreen shrub up to about 1–2 m, with reddish, arching, two-lined younger branches becoming terete with age. The leaves are opposite, sessile to subsessile, oblong to oblong-lanceolate, leathery, with translucent glandular dots, and somewhat glaucous beneath. The flowers are large and showy, golden-yellow, borne singly or in few-flowered terminal cymes; they have five spreading petals, numerous stamens grouped into bundles, and a superior ovary crowned by free styles, conforming to the characteristic Hypericum floral plan. The fruit is a septicidal capsule that splits to release numerous small seeds.
Within the large genus Hypericum the species belongs to the predominantly Asian section of woody, large-flowered shrubs and is closely allied to other Himalayan taxa such as H. hookerianum, from which it is separated by leaf shape, branch character and details of the styles. It is valued horticulturally for its abundant bright flowers and is used locally in folk medicine. Widespread and tolerant of disturbed, open ground, it is not considered threatened, and it readily colonises sunny banks and roadside scrub throughout the western Himalaya.
Author: Choisy · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of Pakistan, Flora of Nepal, Flora of China Vol. 13, Robson: Studies in the genus Hypericum (Guttiferae)