Climber, 10-20 m long, harshly grey or rusty hairy, hairs 0.5-2 mm long, partly late-glabrescent, leafy stem 2-5(-15) mm diam., conspicuously 4-or 5-angular or ribbed, the ribs green and hairy; dioecious or possibly monoecious. Probract absent. Tendrils 2-5-branched. Leaves: petiole 3.5-6 cm long; blade green on drying, membranous, simple, shallowly 3-5-lobed or-angular or unlobed, in outline subcircular or broadly ovate, 8-20 by 7-20 cm, scabrous above and beneath, glands several, scattered, 0.5 mm diam. or less, margin sparsely minutely dentate-serrate, apex acute-acuminate, often with a 10-25 mm long acumen; veins 5(-7), straight. Inflorescences unisexual or possibly sometimes male and female flowers mixed. Male raceme pendent, among the leaves or on the older stem close to the forest floor, single, unbranched or branched at the base forming several racemes in a bundle, dark brown hairy; peduncle 0.3(-2) cm long, 1.5-3 mm thick; rachis not thickened, to 7 cm long, to 30-flowered; bracts caducous, inserted on the pedicel towards the base, c. 1 mm long. Male flowers: conspicuously rusty hairy (pale when living); pedicel 20-40 mm long, persistent, above the insertion of the bract withering into straw-like appendages; receptacle-tube tubular, 50-60 mm long, at throat 5(-7) mm wide; sepals linear, 10-15 mm long, c. 1 mm wide at base, entire; petals narrowly elliptic, c. 20 mm long, threads c. 25 mm long; synandrium 5-6 mm long, with c. 0.5 mm long coarse white acute hairs between the thecae, filaments 3-4 mm long, glabrous; disc consisting of 3 line-shaped thickenings at base of the tube. Female flowers: solitary or several in a simple or compound raceme to 12 cm long; pedicel c. 25 mm long; ovary hairy, (narrowly) fusiform, 10-12 by 3-4 mm, style c. 35 mm long, glabrous, stigma (4-or)5-lobed, c. 3 mm long. Fruit solitary, ripening yellow-green, whitish striped, (narrowly) ovoid, 10-11.5 by 6-7 cm, apex c. 2 mm beaked; exocarp leathery; pericarp carnose (c. 15 mm thick when fresh), dry pericarp 5 mm thick; pulp white, finely fibrous, not bitter; fruiting pedicel 3-5 cm long, c. 3 mm thick. Seeds whitish, pink, cream or pale brown, tumid, with two inflated lateral parts, 10-12 by 17-20 by c. 5 mm, margin absent, edge entire.
Home