Perennial, forming annual stems from a fusiform rootstock. Stems several to many, climbing mainly over low bushes or occasionally prostrate, usually rather stout, herbaceous, longitudinally sulcate, when young densely, later thinly covered with somewhat bent or wavy, flattened, drab, fawn or sometimes whitish hairs, up to at least 3 m long. Leaves herbaceous, soft, dark green, slightly paler beneath, suborbicular-cordate to ovate-cordate in outline, palmately lobed or 5-7-sect to usually a little beyond the middle, on both surfaces thinly covered with the same hairs as found on the stems or a little more densely so on lower surface and always more densely so on main veins on lower surface, 4-10 cm long and 3-9 cm broad; basal sinus usually shallow and wide; lobes ovate, obovate, elliptic or ovate-lanceolate, acute or shortly apiculate to obtuse or rounded or sometimes attenuate into an acute point at the apex, usually contracted at the base, somewhat irregularly denticulate to rather coarsely dentate serrate-dentate, not infrequently some of them or all pinnately lobulate; the middle lobe slightly longer, the other ones gradually shorter towards the base; sinuses between the lobes usually narrow, rounded at their base; petioles covered with the same hairs as the stems but much more densely so, somewhat flattened above, 1-4.5 cm long. Tendrils simple or bifid, thinly covered with the same hairs as stems, leaves and petioles, glabrescent, striate-sulcate at least in lower portion. Male plants: flowers solitary or rarely geminate; pedicels long and slender, finely sulcate, up to 15 cm long; receptacle broadly cup-shaped, 4-5 mm high, 6-8 mm in diam. at the mouth, thinly to more or less densely hairy like pedicels and vegetative parts; sepals lanceolate-subulate, 4-7 mm long, hairy; corolla apricot yellow to pale buff with green venation on outside, 19-23 mm long; shortly hairy mainly on the veins outside; petals acute to acuminate. Female plants: flowers solitary pedicels short, slightly thicker than in the male plants, in fruit incrassate, strongly sulcate, glabrescent, up to about 4 cm long; ovary fusiform, densely villous-lanate with the same type of hairs as found on the other parts, 2-2.5 cm long and 4-5 mm in diam. Fruit oblong-fusiform or ovoid-fusiform, more or less rounded at the base and attenuate to apiculate into an acute apex, at first longitudinally marked with green bands more or less anastomosing over intervening greyish white or yellowish bands, when ripe bright orange-red, nearly glabrous, 7-8 cm long and 2.5-4 cm in diam. Seeds nearly smooth, 6-7 mm long and 3-4 mm wide.
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Perennial herb, annual stems from a fusiform rootstock. Stems several to many, climbing or prostrate, up to 3 m long. Leaves dark green, ± paler below, outline ± cordate, palmately lobed or 5-7-sect to middle, up to 100 x 90 mm, basal sinus shallow; lobes ± ovate, contracted basally, denticulate to serrate-dentate or pinnately lobulate; middle lobe longest; petioles 10-45 mm long. Tendrils simple or bifid. Flowers mostly solitary. Male flowers: pedicels slender, up to 150 mm long; receptacle broadly cup-shaped, 3-5 mm long; lobes lanceolate-subulate, 4-7 mm long, hairy; corolla apricot-yellow to pale buff-green, hairy veins outside, 19-23 mm long; petals ± acute. Female flowers: pedicels up to 40 mm long. Flowering time Sept.-Mar. Fruit: base ± rounded, firstly with longitudinal green, grey-white and yellow bands, when ripe bright orange-red, ± glabrous, up to 80 x 40 mm; pedicels glabrescent. Seeds ± smooth, up to 7 x 4 mm.
Perennial herb; dioecious. Stems annual from a fusiform rootstock, scandent or procumbent, persistently hairy with soft, curved or curly hairs. Tendrils simple or 2-fid. Leaves petiolate; blade broadly ovate to ovate, 40-100 x 30-90 mm, palmately lobed or 5-7-sect, base cordate, both surfaces pubescent; petioles up to 45 mm long. Flowers: corolla 19-23 mm long, apricot-yellow to pale buff-coloured with green venation on outside; Oct.-Jan. Fruit oblong-or ovoid-fusiform; 70-80 mm long, 25-40 mm in diameter, sparsely hairy, bright orange-red when ripe.
A pumpkin family creeper. It forms a woody tuber. The tendrils are divided into two. Young fruit are pale green. The fruit become red when ripe. The seeds have a red juicy envelope around them.
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