Chaenomeles rugosa is a begonia flower.

wrinkled papaya, also known as Malus pedunculata, is one of the traditional "papaya" prototypes in China. Chaenomeles rugosa belongs to the genus Chaenomeles of Rosaceae, which is far from papaya, but closer to rose, apple and cherry. It is worth pointing out that the "Haitang" that we usually see, such as Xifu Haitang and Hangsi Haitang, is actually an apple family, which is characterized by a long flower stalk.

Yang Wanli, a poet in the Song Dynasty, said that "it's not about being drunk and not waking up, and it's not about being lazy in spring", which is precisely to describe the shy feeling of the drooping flowers of Malus pendula. As the name implies, Begonia stipulata has a very short or even no stalk, so that the flowers are close to the branches, hence the name.

The flower of Chaenomeles rugosa is bright red and clings to the branches. When it blooms, it is scarlet and bright. Papaya with wrinkled skin originated in central China, especially in Sichuan, so it is also called "Shu Begonia".

Morphological characteristics

Deciduous shrub, 2 meters high, with erect branches and thorns; Branchlets are cylindrical, slightly flexed, glabrous, purplish brown or dark brown, with sparse light brown lenticels; Winter buds triangular-ovate, acute at the apex, nearly glabrous or pubescent at the edge of scales, purple-brown. Leaf blade ovate to elliptic, sparsely oblong, 3-9 cm long, 1.5-5 cm wide, apex acute, sparsely rounded and obtuse.

The base is wedge-shaped to broad-wedge-shaped, with sharp serrations at the edge, spreading teeth, hairless or pubescent along the lower veins on the sprouting tiller; Petiole is about 1 cm long; Stipules are large, herbaceous, kidney-shaped or semi-circular, thin oval, 5-1 mm long and 12-2 mm wide, with sharp double serrations on the edge and hairless.