Shrub or small tree, 2–9(–12) m. tall, with a swollen pithy often almost conical stem acting as a float. Stems with short and long sticky hairs and nearly always with short sharp spines 0.2–1.5 cm. long. Leaves 20–40-foliolate; leaflets oblong, 0.8–2.65 cm. long, 4–10 mm. wide, truncate or slightly emarginate at the apex, obliquely rounded at the base, entire, somewhat glaucous beneath, glabrescent above, pubescent with slightly tubercular-based short hairs and often minutely asperulous on the margins and midnerve beneath; venation dark beneath; petiole and rhachis together 4–16 cm. long, densely covered with stiff bristly hairs and shorter pubescence and also often with short spinelets; petiolules 0.5–1 mm. long; stipules broadly ovate, 1–1.3 cm. long, 6–9 mm. wide, auriculate on one side only, velvety, eventually deciduous. Inflorescences axillary, 1–4-flowered; rhachis 1–4.5 cm. long; peduncle 1.3 cm. long; pedicels 1.2–1.6 cm. long; bracts 6–7 mm. long, 3–5 mm. wide; bracteoles ovate or elliptic, asymmetrical, 1–1.6 cm. long, 5–10 mm. wide, velvety. Calyx densely pubescent and with longer sticky bristly hairs, 2-lipped, the lips entire or 2–3-toothed at the apex, one ovate-lanceolate, 1.9–2.5 cm. long, 0.6–1.2 cm. wide, the other ovate-oblong, 1.5–2 cm. long, 0.6–1.1 cm. wide. Standard yellow to orange, rounded, 3–4.7 cm. long and wide, emarginate, puberulous above on outer surface; wings and keel yellow, the petals of the latter laciniate along their lower margins. Pods spirally contorted, 10–14 cm. long when unrolled, 6–17-jointed, densely covered with glandular bristly tubercular-based hairs and with short pubescence as well; articles ± oblong or trapeziform, 6–8 mm. long, 7–9 mm. wide, venulose beneath the dense indumentum. Seeds dark purplish-brown, reniform, with a slightly eccentric hilum, slightly beaked resembling the front of a canoe, longest dimension 6 mm., shorter dimension 3.8 mm., 2 mm. thick. Fig. 54/1, p. 366.
