Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Twining lianas, scandent shrubs, or sometimes small erect shrubs, with milky sap.

Stems:

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Opposite or in whorls of 3–4 per node. Blades coriaceous and usually somewhat brittle, axillary glands absent. Margins entire. Petiolate. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers few in axillary cymes. Flowers bisexual (perfect); subtended by minute bracts at base of pedicel. Calyx deeply 5-lobed. Corolla salverform, 5-lobed. Stamens 5, inserted on corolla tube. Ovary superior, 2, distinct; ovules 4–6 per ovary; style 1, uniting the ovaries; stigma with a tuft of hairs toward apex.

Fruit: Fruit drupaceous; often moniliform. Seeds 2–5 or 1 by abortion; 1 in each joint of the fruit.

Ploidy:

Habitat:

Elevation Range: