Mucuna

Woody lianes or herbaceous climbers. Leaves pinnately 3-foliolate, stipulate. Flowers maroon, cardinal red, lilac or green, fairly conspicuous in axillary racemes; bracts small, sometimes caducous. Calyx often hairy, with campanulate tube; 2 upper lobes connate, and lowest longer than 2 laterals. Petals: vexillum ovate-orbicular, sessile, folded together, shortly clawed, eared at base with ears often upturned; wings incurved, sessile, eared, often adhering to keel; keel sessile, incurved at apex or rostrate, equalling or longer than wings, eared. Stamens diadelphous; alternate filaments sometimes swollen at apex; anthers unequal. Ovary sessile or stipitate, few-ovuled, surrounded by a cupular disc at base, villous; style filiform, incurved, often hairy with small, terminal stigma. Pod thick, ovate, oblong or linear, 2-valved, septate, often covered with stinging hairs. Seeds round or transversely oblong. x= 11 ( polyploidy).