Stachyanthus

Dioecious climbing shrubs; branches hirsute. Leaves alternate, entire, shortly petiolate, penninerved. Inflorescences: male and female in loose spikes or racemes arranged in fascicles on cushions at nodes of older branches; bracts small. Male flowers: 5- or 6-merous; calyx cup-shaped, shortly toothed; petals valvate, coiled outwards before anthesis; stamens with filiform filaments +/- as long as linear anthers; disc present or absent. Female flowers similar to male ones but disc always absent; ovary 1-locular, oblong-ovate, stigma sessile, discoid. Fruit an ellipsoid, +/- flattened drupe; endocarp crustaceous, verrucose to smooth inside. Seed often pitted; endosperm markedly mottled.