Flagellaria L.

Robust, climbing, entirely glabrous herbs with terete, solid, hard stems. Leaves bifarious, subsessile, tapering towards the top and there, barring the very lowest, ending in a dorsally flattened, hard tendril, which is coiled in the shape of a watch-spring and thickens after having grasped a support, firmly herbaceous, densely longitudinally nerved, with numerous rather faint, short, oblique cross-nervules, not plicate. Leaf-sheaths tubular, in the Malaysian species closed up to the very apex. Panicles most variable as to size. Flowers ☿. Tepals free, coloured, membranous, 3 inner largest, persistent. Filaments filiform, at last exserted; anthers linear or linear-oblong, inserted with a bifid base. Ovary narrow, obtusely triangular; style very short; stigmas rather long, linear-clavate, at last exserted. Drupe sub-globose; exocarp succulent, thin; endocarp bony, 1-or rarely 2-seeded. Seeds globose or, by mutual pressure, more or less flattened; testa crustaceous.

Plants of humid but not constantly swampy forests.