genus descriptions: SSTAs

Dioecious herbaceous climbers; branches often puberulous; tendrils 2-furcate. Leaves : petiole not glandular; blade broadly ovate-cordate, with a wide sinus, acutely acuminate, entire or slightly lobulate-toothed, thinly coriaceous, very conspicuously and closely reticulate beneath with prominent looped nerves. Male flowers fairly large, in several- to many-flowered racemes, on long axillary peduncles; bracts linear; receptacle somewhat inflated basally and narrowed towards apex; sepals 5, short, triangular with subulate points, puberulous; petals 5, free, asymmetrically obovate, mucronate, entire, nervose, finely puberulous; stamens 3(5), two of them 2-thecous, one 1-thecous, thecae conduplicate, arising at bottom of receptacle; pistillode absent. Female flowers solitary; perianth similar to that of male flowers; ovary narrowly oblong, with 3 placentas; ovules many, horizontal. Fruit ovoid, fleshy, smooth. Seeds many, flattened, smooth, slightly oblique.

Monoecious, glabrous, scandent perennial herbs; young stems green-spotted. Leaves simple, palmately lobed, petiolate. Tendrils proximally 2-fid. Probracts present, small. Flowers unisexual, in sessile or shortly racemose few- to many-flowered axillary clusters, male and female often co-axillary. Male flowers on slender pedicels; receptacle tube short and broad; lobes small, remote; corolla whitish or pale yellow, gamopetalous, 5-lobed, lobes entire; stamens 3, two 2-thecous, one 1-thecous, free; filaments arising on receptacle tube; connectives broad; thecae flexuous; disc +/-undulate, adnate to receptacle tube. Female flowers subsessile; ovary terete; ovules rather few, horizontal; receptacle tube smaller and narrower than in male flowers, perianth otherwise similar; stigma 3-lobed. Fruits solitary or clustered, subsessile, baccate, fleshy, globose to ellipsoid, indehiscent, red with white longitudinal stripes or lines of markings. Seeds rather small, pyriform, with highly convex faces and thick 2-grooved, rugulose margins.

Monoecious, annual, prostrate or scandent herbs. Leaves simple, palmately 5-7-lobed, petiolate, asperulose or scabrid, petiolate. Tendrils proximally 2-6-fid. Flowers unisexual. Male flowers racemose; receptacle tube broadly campanulate, lobes large, enclosing petals in bud, entire; petals 5, free, entire, yellow or whitish; stamens 5, all 1-thecous, or three 1-thecous, or two 2-thecous and one 1-thecous; filaments arising on receptacle tube, free; anthers free; connectives broad; thecae much convoluted. Female flowers solitary; ovary smooth, ribbed, tuberculate or spiny; ovules many, horizontal; stigma 3-lobed. Fruit globose to cylindric, rostrate, smooth, ribbed or spiny, dry, brownish, fibrous, dehiscent by an apical operculum. Seeds compressed, oblong-elliptic in outline.

Monoecious, annual, climbing or trailing herbs; stems usually +/-hairy; tendrils 3-5-fid. Leaves simple, palmately 5-lobed, broadly ovate- or reniform-cordate in outline. Male flowers small, few to many in simple or branched racemes, often whorled or +/-capitate; receptacle tube shallowly campanulate, lobes 5, small, dentiform; petals 5, united at very base, entire; stamens 3, filaments arising at base of tube, united into a central column, anthers united into a head or sometimes +/-free, thecae arcuate, flexuose or triplicate. Female flowers 3-20 subsessile in capitate, pedunculate groups, smaller than and coaxillary with male flowers; receptacle tube campanulate, lobes 5, triangular-subulate; petals 5, +/-triangular; ovary 1-locular, ovoid and beaked, beset with forward-curving, subappressed bristles; ovule solitary, pendulous. Fruit rather small, dry and coriaceous or woody, 1-seeded, eventually splitting, ovoid and beaked or fusiform, +/-hairy and usually beset with bristles or spines, each arising on a small basal tubercle, 3-20 borne in subsessile clusters on a short to fairly long peduncle. Seed broadly ovate-oblong in outline, compressed, with slight apical thickenings; testa smooth, brown.