Shrubs, 1-5 m tall. Branches hollow, branchlets, petioles, peduncles, bracts, and sepals adpressed pubescent and sometimes glandular hairy. Petiole 5-15 mm; leaf blade ovate to lanceolate, 4-13 × 2-6 cm, both surfaces glabrescent to sparsely adpressed pubescent, base cuneate to subcordate, margin entire to dentate, occasionally irregularly sinuate, apex acuminate to caudate. Inflorescence terminal or axillary; peduncle 6-30 mm. Whorls 1-10, each whorl composed of 2 opposite sessile, 3-flowered cymes subtended by green, purplish, or purple-red leaflike involucral bracts and bracts; involucral pair of bracts up to 2.5 cm, 4 outer bracts narrower and shorter, 8 inner bracts very small. Ovary oblong, 3-4 mm, densely glandular hairy. Calyx shortly fused at base, sometimes to half way; lobes lanceolate to linear, sometimes deltoid, 1-9 mm. Corolla white to pink, sometimes purple-red, funnelform, 1.2-1.8 cm, outside pubescent; lobes orbicular-ovate, ca. 5 mm. Stamens subequaling corolla. Ovary 5-locular; style slightly exceeding corolla, glabrous. Berry red, turning black-purple, ovoid or subglobose, with persistent calyx, 5-7 mm in diam.; seeds minute, numerous, brownish, broadly ellipsoid to oblong, slightly compressed, ca. 1 mm. Fl. (May-)Jun-Sep(-Oct), fr. (Aug-)Sep-Oct. 2n = 18.
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Shrub to 2-(3) m high; stems hollow, glabrous, green, glaucous at first. Petiole 0.5-2-(5) cm long, purplish, with hairy groove on upper side. Lamina 4-14-(24) × 1.5-8-(12) cm, ovate or broad-ovate, mostly entire, sometimes 5-9-lobed (rarely divided almost to midrib) with rounded sinuses, becoming glabrous except for midrib and bases of main veins; base rounded to cordate; apex long-acuminate. Infl. 3-8 cm long at flowering. Bracts mostly 1-3 cm long, sessile, broad-ovate, aristate-acuminate, ± glandular-hairy, usually deep reddish purple. Calyx small, hidden by bracts; lobes very unequal. Corolla c. 1.5 cm long, funnelform, white; lobes rounded at apex, much < tube, with glandular-hairy margins. Stamens shortly exserted. Style > stamens. Berry 7-10 mm diam., subglobose, dark brownish purple, glandular-hairy. Seed 1.1-1.5 mm long, obovoid-ellipsoid, shining brown, minutely white-dotted.
A deciduous shrub. It grows to 1.5-2.5 m high. It spreads 1.8 m wide. The stems have a glaucous bloom and then are dark green and polished. They are like thick grass shoots and hollow. It forms a thicket with time. The leaves are opposite and narrowly oval. The leaves are pointed. The flowers are white and funnel shaped in racemes 10 cm long. They are at the ends of branches. They droop. There are wine-red bracts around the flowers. The fruit are purplish-black berries.
It is a temperate plant. It can tolerate light frosts. It grows best in moderately fertile well drained soil. It can grow in full sun or part shade. It grows between 1,500-3,000 m altitude in the Himalayas. It suits hardiness zones 7-10. Tasmania Herbarium.
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Scrub and shady forests, often by streams, to 3000 metres.
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