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Scientific name: Picea brachytyla var. complanata (Mast.) W.C.Cheng ex Rehder 1940
Synonyms: Picea brachytyla subsp. complanata (Mast.) Silba, Picea complanata Mast.
Common names: You mai diao shan (Chinese)
Tree to 35(-40) m tall, with trunk to 1(-1.2) m in diameter. Mature bark pale gray or gray, usually remaining flaky. Crown broadly conical, opening up with age, with thin, horizontal or slightly downswept branches bearing dangling side branches. New branchlets very pale yellowish brown, hairless or thinly hairy. Buds 4-8 mm long, slightly resinous. Needles dark green mostly 1-2 cm long, up to 2 mm wide, thick. Pollen cones 10-25 mm long, red. Seed cones 8-15 cm long, 3.5-5 cm wide when opened, purplish green before maturity. Seed scales broadly obovate-oblong, 2-2.5 cm long, 1.5-1.8 cm wide at mid-cone, with usually rounded or truncate (sometimes elongate-emarginate) and straight or recurved upper margins. Seed body 3-4 mm long, the wing about 7-9 mm longer.
China: W Sichuan, NW Yunnan, SE Xizang (Tibet), N Myanmar (Burma), possibly also in India: east Arunachal Pradesh, 1,600-3,800 m.
Red List Category & Criteria: Vulnerable
The fragmented range and effects of past logging (more than 30% population reduction in past 100 years) render this variety Vulnerable. The fact that the decline may not be reversible.
In coniferous forests at elevations between (1,600-)2,000 and 3,600(-3,800) m on mountain slopes and in high river basins. Picea brachytyla var. complanata occurs in small stands or in mixture with other conifers and broadleafed trees, rarely forming pure stands. The stands have reduced in size over the past century due to a combination of logging and conversion of land to agriculture.
The ban on logging will reduce the rate of loss of trees but is unlikely to cause loss to cease altogether. Establishment of a conservation programme desirable.
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