Planch.
Description
Ampelocissus rugosa is a tendril-climbing vine of the Himalaya and adjacent south-east Asia, recorded from Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, Myanmar and Vietnam. Its roughly 95 georeferenced collections, the fewest in this group, indicate a relatively restricted and under-collected distribution along the subtropical-to-warm-temperate forest belt of the Himalayan foothills. It grows in forest margins, thickets, ravines and along streams, scrambling over shrubs and trees. The photographed plant from Garhwal at Kunol at 2400 m in September represents the upper part of its altitudinal range and its late-monsoon fruiting period, when the vine bears its grape-like infructescences.
It is a robust herbaceous to woody climber with leaf-opposed tendrils characteristic of the grape family. The simple leaves are broadly ovate to cordate in outline, sometimes shallowly lobed, with a toothed margin and a rugose (wrinkled) upper surface that gives the species its epithet; the lower surface is often tomentose. The inflorescence is a leaf-opposed, compound cyme or panicle, typically with a basal tendril, bearing many small, greenish flowers with a four- to five-merous calyx and corolla and a fleshy disc around the ovary. The fruit is a small, globose, fleshy berry, ripening dark purple to black and containing one or few hard seeds, the cluster superficially resembling a wild grape.
Ampelocissus is a pantropical genus of the Vitaceae closely allied to Vitis, distinguished by its tendril-bearing inflorescences and frequently tuberous rootstock. Several Asian species are gathered locally for their edible, acidic fruits and have potential as wild relatives of the cultivated grape. A. rugosa is a sparsely documented Himalayan vine; while not formally assessed, its limited collection record warrants attention to forest-margin habitats under pressure from clearance.
Author: Planch. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 12, Flora of Bhutan Vol. 2, Flora of Nepal, Latiff's Revision of Asian Ampelocissus