Rubus papuanus Schltr. ex Diels

Erect or scrambling small shrubs, up to 80 cm high. Stems soft-hairy, glabrescent, prickles straight, slender, spine-like, up to 1 cm, red. (Sub)-sessile red or yellow glands often present on many parts. Leaves imparipinnate, up to 10 cm long, petiole 0.5-1 (-1.5) cm long. Stipules oblong to linear-lanceolate, 4-9 by 1-3 mm, glabrous. Leaflets 6-9(-10) (sub)opposite pairs, (broadly) ovate, 6-15 by 4-9 mm, base rounded to cuneate, margin rather deeply serrate, apex pointed to acuminate, pergamentaceous, 3-5 pairs of nerves, both surfaces glabrous or almost so. Inflorescence poor, at most 1 or 2 axillary flowers under the terminal one. Pedicels up to 2.5 cm long, soft-hairy. Flowers more or less pendulous. Hypanthium up to 6 mm across, soft-hairy to glabrous outside and with some spines, the largest of those up to c. 1 cm, alternating with the sepals. Sepals narrowly triangular, 6-11 by 2-4 mm including the up to 3 mm long acumen, indumentum outside as hypanthium and woolly on the covered parts. Petals falling early, broadly obovate to orbicular, 6-12(-18) mm long, rounded or retuse, white. Stamens 20-50, filaments up to 3 mm, anthers c. 0.8 mm long. Pistils 70-100, ovaries glabrous or dorsally with few hairs, on elevated, glabrous torus with pistils down to the base, style up to 1.5 mm long. Collective fruits ovoid, up to 2 by 1.5 cm, sepals ultimately spreading. Fruits up to 2.5 mm long, bright red, mesocarp fleshy but only a thin layer when dry.

It is a tropical plant. In PNG it is recorded in the Western Highlands in subalpine grassland.