Dioscorea filiformis Blume

Tuber descending deeply into the soil, 50 cm and more long, increasing in diameter somewhat downwards until 2 cm through near the apex; flesh white or nearly so, esculent. Plant glabrous. Stem unarmed, often with a purple flush, with very faint ridges. Bulbils produced. Leaves opposed on the larger stems, but more often alternate, herbaceous, between cordate and hastate, the basal sinus cut into a bay on either side of the petiole (this character is very well marked in the type of D. myriantha, but not so well marked in the type of D. filiformis; the laminae in the first measure to 10 by 7 cm and those in the second to 10 by 5½ cm), acuminate, 5-7-nerved, the first pair of primary nerves nearer to the margin than to the midrib; upper surface dull; lower often tinted with purple; petiole rather shorter than the lamina. Male flowering axes either on special leafless branches with relatively long internodes between one group of axes and the next, or less commonly in fascicles in leaf-axils, 10-15 mm long, zigzag with a flower on each angle, narrowly ridged beneath each bract. Buds globose over a flat base and with a minute wart on the upper side against the axis, 1 mm long. Female flowering axes solitary, to 20 cm long, rather slender and a little flexed at the flowers, but not zigzag as are the male flowers. Capsules rather large; apex retuse; base almost truncate; wings to 24 by 22 mm, somewhat shining when dry; stipe 3 mm long.

A lowland plant apparently indifferent to chalk, but demanding drainage.

The tubers are boiled and eaten.