Japan Flora: Plant: Shrub, up to 7 m tall, stems with rather thick cork. Young shoots weakly pilose or almost glabrous. Leaves: Leaves of fertile shoots 10-16 cm long, with 3-5 leaflets. Petiole 2-4(5) cm long, pilose. Terminal leaflets broadly elliptic, less commonly elliptic, 3-12(15) cm long and 2.5-7 cm wide, apex abruptly elongate-acuminate, base rounded or rounded-cuneate, rarely cuneate, both surfaces ± pilose, especially along veins beneath, pubescence greatly reduced by autumn. Inflorescence: Rather spreading, up to 10 cm wide, densely fine-pilose. Flowers: Corolla 5-6(7.5) mm in diameter, greenish-yellow. Fruit: Drupes about 5 mm in diameter, bright red.

Distribution: Southern Sakhalin, Southern Kuril Islands (Fig. 96). In forest belt, more frequently along edges and in sparse coniferous and mixed coniferous-broadleaved forests. Flowering in June-July. Ornamental large shrub.

General distribution: Japanese-Chinese. Described from Japan (Kyushu Island).

Note: A critical species with very complex synonymy and several described infraspecific taxa. In many works on Far East flora, it is interpreted and described according to Japanese treatments. Our plants differ in number and shape of leaflets, stronger pubescence, larger fruits, and other characteristics. Specimens from the Kurils, which A. I. Poyarkova (1958) did not see, show more stable characteristics, while in Southern Sakhalin many plants show transitional characteristics to S. racemosa. The latter were assigned by Poyarkova to a separate species - S. sachalinensis Pojark.