Stems climbing, to 25 m, pubescent to glabrate. Leaves: petiole 2-5 cm; blade ovate to reniform, to 9 × 5.5 cm, base cordate, apex obtuse to rounded, often mucronate. Panicles 4-15 cm; peduncle 2-10 cm; pedicel 1-10 mm. Flowers: sepals white to greenish white, reticulate-veined, oblong to ovate or obovate, 4-6.5 mm. Cypselas 2.5 mm (perhaps not maturing in se U.S.), crowned by winglike sepals to 6 × 3 mm.

Flowering summer-fall. Hammocks, orchards, waste places, ravines; 0-30 m; Fla., Tex.; Mexico; Central America; native to subtropical and tropical America.

The root of Agdestis clematidea allegedly can weigh as much as 68 kg and resemble a large boulder.