Shrub, woody liana or tree; branchlets often spirally coiled, armed, the spines subulate, up to 0.4 cm. long, glabrous. Leaves with subsessile leaflets, these up to 80, oblong, 0.5-4.5 (-10) mm. long, 0.2-1.3 (-3) mm. wide, obtuse, mucronulate, the costa plane and subevanescent above, the blade stiff, thinly coriaceous, curled, glabrous to sparsely pilose above, minutely puberulent to pilose beneath; rachises 30-40 cm. long, ferruginous; petioles 0.5-2 cm. long, ferruginous; stipules widely subulate, up to 1 cm. long. Panicles terminal, up to 30 cm. long, the rachis terete, the branches arcuate, up to 3 cm. long, patulous, usually paired and subequal, subtended by reflexed spines (stipules?), the flowers 1.0-15 on the longer branches; bracteoles suborbicular, 1.5-3.5 mm. long, villose, with some trichomes up to 1.7 mm. long, obviously bulbous. Flowers with the hypanthium companulate, about 5.5 mm. long, drying purple, glabrous, the teeth scarcely evident to mammiform, 0.5-0.8 mm. long, obtuse, the upper teeth usually united, truncate, the carinal teeth narrower; vexillum reflexed, suborbicular, 6.5-10 mm. long, glabrous or villosulose; wing petals falcately oblong, 7-8 mm. long, glabrous or villosulose, subdeltoid at the apex, attenuate at the base, the auricle obvious; carinal petals obovate or subreniform, 6-7 mm. long, obtuse, the upper margin straight, the hairs few along the lower margin, the claw strongly eccentric; stamens monadelphous or diadel-phous, the sheath curved, 4-5 mm. long, glabrous, the filaments more than one half the length of the sheath, the anthers about 0.6 mm. long; ovary stipitate for about 3 mm., densely sericeous, the style 1.5-3 mm. long. Fruits with the seminiferous area flat or scarcely turgid, falcately oblong, 1.2-5 cm. long, about 0.8 cm. wide, the wing cultriform, about 5 cm. long.
Moist or dry thickets or forest, often along stream banks, sometimes in pine forest, at elevations up to 1,200 metres. Non-inundated habitats and along river banks, in rain forest, coastal dry forest and dry inter Andean valleys
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