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The Siebold ardisia (Ardisia sieboldii) belongs to Myrsinaceae (the Myrsine family). It is a small evergreen tree that is distributed from the southern part of Shikoku to Kyushu, the Ryukyu Islands, the Ogasawara Islands in Japan, as wella as Taiwan and the southeastern part of China. It grows in evergreen forests and reaches a height of 2 to 8 m. The leaves are obovate to oblanceolate, thick, and entire. From May to July, umbels or cymose inflorescences appear from the upper leaf axils, producing white to pale red flowers. The fruit is a spherical drupe that ripens to a blackish purple color around December and remains on the tree until the following spring. In Taiwanese Chinese, it is called "樹杞" and "多枝紫金牛" (duo zhi zi jin niu) in Chinese.
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