From the Brazilian name for Cassava.
Shrubs or trees, evergreen, perennial,male and female flowers on the same plant; stems and foliage with watery-white latex. Indumentum of simple, multicellular hairs. Stipules entire, conspicuous or inconspicuous, soon shed. Leaves alternate, stalked, unlobed or usually deeply 3-11-palmatilobed to palmatipartite, palminerved, without glands; margins entire. Inflorescences terminal or axillary, racemose or paniculate, solitary, bisexual and androgynous, with flowers in bracted clusters. Male flowers stalked; calyx lobes 5, overlapping, long-fused; petals absent; disk of free lobes; stamens 10, filaments free and 2-rowed. Female flowers stalked; calyx lobes 5, overlapping, long-fused; petals absent; disk hypogynous, entire or lobed; ovary 3-chambered, ovules 1 per chamber; styles shortly fused at base, simple. Fruits capsular, dehiscent, 3-lobed, surface smooth. Seeds roundish to ellipsoid; carunculate, non-arilloid.
About 100 species in the New World tropics. 2 species are commonly cultivated.
Cuttings or division of root tubers. Frost-sensitive.
Shrubs, leaves alternate and 3-11-palmatilobed to palmatipartite.
Rogers & Fleming (1973), Rogers & Appan (1973).
Source: (2002). Euphorbiaceae. In: . Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia. Volume 3. Flowering plants. Dicotyledons. Part 2. The identification of garden and cultivated plants. University of New South Wales Press.
