D.Don
Description
Gaultheria nummularioides D.Don is a prostrate, creeping dwarf shrub of the temperate and subalpine Himalaya and adjacent mountains of East and Southeast Asia. Its range extends through Nepal, NE and NW India, Bhutan, Myanmar and SW China, with outlying records in Malesia (Indonesia, Malaysia) and cultivated occurrences in Japan, Great Britain and the United States; GBIF documents over 1,200 collections across this wide span. It typically grows between 2,000 and 4,000 m in mossy forest margins, on damp rocks, banks and epiphytically on tree trunks, as recorded for the photographed plant from Garhwal at Shertoli, 3,200 m, in September. It favours humid, shaded, acidic substrates and is a characteristic component of Rhododendron–oak understorey and bryophyte-rich rock communities.
The plant forms wiry, much-branched, reddish-brown procumbent stems clothed in stiff brown bristles, rooting at the nodes to form dense mats. Leaves are small, distichous, ovate to rounded (nummularioides referring to the coin-like blade), 5–12 mm long, coriaceous, dark green and glossy above, the margins finely toothed and ciliate. Flowers are solitary and axillary, pendent on short pedicels, the corolla campanulate to urceolate, white tinged pink, 4–5 mm long with five short recurved lobes; the calyx is often reddish. The fruit is a fleshy blue-black berry-like capsule enclosed by the accrescent succulent calyx.
The genus Gaultheria (subfamily Vaccinioideae) is notable for aromatic foliage rich in methyl salicylate; G. nummularioides is locally used as a fragrant and medicinal plant. Its broad Himalayan-to-Malesian distribution illustrates the floristic continuity of the Sino-Himalayan ericaceous element. The species is common and not of conservation concern across most of its range.
Author: D.Don · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 14, Flora of Bhutan Vol. 2, Flora of Nepal, Airy Shaw: The Gaultheria-Pernettya complex (Kew Bulletin)