A rapid-growing and short-lived medium to tall tree, height to 35 m.; trunk simple with very few branches, hollow, exuding copious white latex when cut; upper part of trunk and branches armed with short straight prickles; old bark becoming ± smooth and dark greenish-grey in colour. Leaves clustered at branch tips; petioles to 45 cm. long, glabrous, terete; lamina broadly ovate to suborbicular in outline, to 25 cm. long, 35 cm. wide, palmately divided into 3–5 lobes but the terminal lobe sometimes deeply incised with a tendency to a 7-lobed condition, ± glabrous, main nerves 5–7, pinkish to pale yellow in colour, giving a very decorative appearance to young plants; lobes ± ovate or rhomboidal, ranging from ± same length as the undivided portion to four times as long; leaf-margin entire or lobulate. Inflorescences axillary; ♂ paniculate, many-flowered with rhachis to 40 cm. long, ± farinose and flowers sessile; ♀ shortly racemose, bearing 1–5 flowers with rhachis thick and woody, to 3.5 cm. long, and pedicels short and stout, to 5 mm. long. Male flowers : calyx to 4.5 mm. long, 4 mm. diam., lobes ± obsolete; corolla cream; tube to 2.5 cm. long and 4 mm. in diameter; lobes lanceolate, to 1.5 cm. long and 4 mm. wide; filaments of episepalous stamens to 6 mm. long, of epipetalous to 3 mm. long, all connate at base into a ± 2-mm. long tube; anthers linear-lanceolate; rudimentary ovary and style present. Female flowers : calyx to 5 mm. long and 1 cm. in diameter; corolla-lobes pale greenish externally, cream internally, to 3.0 cm. long, 1 cm. wide; androecium entirely absent; ovary 5-angled, to 1.5 cm. long, 1 cm. in diameter, glabrous; style to 3 mm. long; stigmas to 1.3 cm. long, densely beset with short papillose hairs. Fruit a greenish-yellow, smooth, 5-angled berry, to 8 cm. long, closely resembling a small papaw; seeds to 7 mm. long, with acute apex. Fig. 1.
