Flora of North America species comparison

erect, not viny, 1.5-6.5 dm, hirsute (sometimes sparsely so in var. hirsutissima) or densely short, soft-pubescent to nearly glabrous.

climbing, 3-6 m. Leaf blade pinnate or 2-ternate, 5-9-foliolate, membranous;

leaflets ovate to lanceolate, largest 4-9 × 2.5-9 cm, surfaces abaxially sparsely to densely pilose, adaxially glabrate;

proximal and lateral leaflets typically 3-cleft, unlobed or few-lobed, margins coarsely toothed or entire, surfaces sparsely pubescent or nearly glabrous; ultimate venation conspicuous.

blade 2-3-pinnate;

leaflets often deeply 2-several-lobed, if lobed than lateral lobes usually small and distinctly narrower than central portion, leaflets or lobes linear to lanceolate, 1-6 × 0.05-1.5 cm, thin, not prominently reticulate;

surfaces sparsely to densely silky-hirsute, not glaucous.

terminal, flowers solitary.

axillary, 3-many-flowered simple to compound panicles with central axis.

broadly cylindric to urn-shaped;

sepals very dark violet-blue or rarely pink or white, oblong-lanceolate, 2.5-4.5 cm, margins narrowly expanded distally, 0.5-2 mm wide, thin, distally ± crisped, tomentose, tips obtuse to acute, slightly spreading, abaxially usually densely hirsute, occasionally moderately so.

unisexual;

pedicel slender, 11-13 mm, to 2 cm in fruit;

sepals wide-spreading, not recurved, white to cream, oblong or obovate to oblanceolate, 6-14 × 2-5 mm, abaxially densely white-hairy, adaxially sparsely white-hairy;

stamens ca. 30-50;

staminodes absent or fewer than stamens;

pistils 18-35.

bodies densely long-pubescent;

beak 4-9 cm, plumose.

ovate, ca. 3.5 × 1.5 mm, conspicuously rimmed, sparsely short hairy;

beak 2.5-3.5 cm.