Proboscidea

Broad-topped, sticky-pubescent, annual herbs with stout, branched stems. Leaves large, opposite, long-petiolate, broadly ovate, mature ones 5-lobed, base cordate, margin irregularly and shallowly toothed, glandular-pubescent, veins digitate at base, otherwise pinnate. Flowers large, in few-flowered, loose, axillary racemes, lilac to purple. Calyx spathe-like, with 5 +/- connate, unequal lobes. Corolla campanulate, obscurely 2-lipped, limb short, flaring. Stamens didynamous, included; staminodes 0. Nectary regular. Ovary ovate, tapering into persistent style, 2-carpellate but 1-locular, divided by 2 +/- T-shaped intrusions or septa into 5 chambers, 4 peripheral and 1 central; placentation parietal with several ovules borne on peripheral edges of septa; stigma broader than style, 2-lobed. Fruit a cylindric-ovoid, 2-valved capsule, tapering into a long, curved beak which splits, forming 2 large, opposed, hook-like appendages when dry, viscid-tomentose, with deciduous, fleshy pericarp and woody endocarp crested longitudinally on posterior side. Seeds obovate, crinkled, without wings. x = 15.