Shrubs to medium-sized trees, unarmed or with axillary spines [thorns], terrestrial, without raphides in tissues, dioecious. Leaves opposite, with tertiary and quaternary venation not lineolate, without domatia; stipules interpetiolar or sometimes shortly fused around stem, deciduous, elliptic to obovate or ovate, acute to rounded, adaxially glabrous, erect and pressed together back-to-back in bud. Staminate (male) inflorescences terminal on main stems, cymose, 3-16-flowered, subsessile to shortly pedunculate, bracteate or bracts reduced. Staminate (male) flowers pedicellate in fasciulate to cymose groups, medium-sized; hypanthium narrowly cylindrical; calyx limb reduced, truncate to shallowly 4-6(7) lobed, without calycophylls; corolla salverform to funnelform, white to cream, internally glabrous, lobes 4-6(7), elliptic to lanceolate, generally shorter lthan the tube, convolute (contorted) to the left in bud, spreading to markedly reflexed at anthesis; stamens 4-6(7), anthers subsessile, included or with tips shortly exserted, narrowly ellipsoid, with triangular apical appendage, pollen 3-6-porate or -colporoidate, exine reticulate; pistillode with slender stylar portion, stigmatic portion short, 2-4-lobed, included, positioned near middle part or tips of anthers in corolla tube. Pistillate (female) flowers terminal on main stems, solitary, subtended by the terminal stipule and sometimes several stipuliform bracts; hypanthium subglobose to ellipsoid; calyx limb reduced, truncate to shallowly 4-6(7) lobed, without calycophylls; corolla salverform or funnelform, often rather fleshy, white to cream, internally glabrous, lobes (4)5-7, usually 1 more than the number of lobes in the staminate flower of the corresponding species, elliptic to lanceolate, generally shorter than the tube, convolute to left in bud, spreading to markedly reflexed at anthesis; staminodes similar to stamens (Persson, 2003: fig. 2G); style slender, stigmas 4, positioned at mouth of corolla tube next to tops of staminodes; ovary 4-locular, ovules 10-20 in each locule, horizontal on axile placentas. Fruit baccate, subglobose to ellipsoid, fleshy inside a leathery to woody pericarp, smooth to waxy and brown to yellowed or black, with calyx limb persistent; seeds irrregularly subglogose or depressed-oblong, embedded in pulp, smooth, exostestal cells smooth, elongate (5-10 times longer than wide), without thin secondary thickenings in radial walls.

 Key to Species of Agouticarpa; adapted from Persson & Delprete, Fl. Neotropica 119: 37

1. Plants with axillary spines; montane forest at 1500-2100 m, northern Peru......Agouticarpa spinosa p.p.

1'. Plants without axillary spines; lowland to montane forest, at 0-2400 m, Costa Rica through Bolivia and western Brazil.

   2'. Leaf blades hirsute, velutinous, pilose, hirtellous, or strigose abaxially. 

       3'. Leaf blades hirsute abaxially; staminate flowers with pedicels 0-25 mm long; staminate corolla with tube funnelform, lobes 6-7, 1/4-1/3 as long as the tube; fruits hirsute; 1350-2400 m, south-central to southern Ecuador on eastern Andean slopes......Agouticarpa hirsuta

       3'. Leaf blades velutinous to hirtellous, pilose, hirsute, or strigose abaxially; staminate flowers with pedicels 0-8 mm long; staminate corolla with tube cylrindrical, lobes 5-6, 1/2 as long as to about equal to the tube; glabrous; 1300-2200 m in central and western Ecuador on western Andean slopes, or 100-500 m in western Amazon basin of Ecuador and Peru, or with pedicels 0-19 mm long in lowlands of Chocó region in western Colombia. 

           4. Leaf blades velutinous to hirtellous abaxially; lowlands of western Amazon basin in Ecuador and Peru.....Agouticarpa velutina

           4'. Leaf blades pilose, hirsute, hirtellous, or strigose abaxially; lowlands to montane forest, western Colombia to central Ecuador. 

               5. Staminate pedicels 0-8 mm long; at 1300-2200 m in central and western Ecuador on western Andean slopes.....Agouticarpa grandistipula

               5'. Staminate pedicels 0-19 mm long; at 700-1300 m, southern Central America through western Colombia.....Agouticarpa williamsii p.p.

   2'. Leaves glabrous or puberulous abaxially. 

      6. Leaf blades elliptic to narrowly so, papyraceous to chartaceous, with their length to width ratio 2.1-3.5:1 or sometimes 5.5:1; staminate corolla 4-lobed; mature fruit 1.2-4.5 cm in diameter, shiny and blackened, with mesocarp thin, 1-3 mm thick, and the outlines of the seeds often visible on the surface of dried fruits; widespread, at 0-1200 m, Panama to Bolivia and western Brazil....Agouticarpa curviflora

      6'. Leaf blades elliptic to broadly so, papyraceous to chartaceous, subcoriaceious, or coriacedous, with their length to width ratio 1.2:1-3.5:1; staminate corolla 4-6-lobed; mature fruit 4-10 cm in diameter, brown to yellowed, with mesocarp fleshy, 8-20 mm thick, and the outlines of the seeds not visible on the outside of dried fruits; 0-2300 m, Costa Rica to Bolivia. 

          7. Leaf blades chartaceous, 7-20 x 3.5-8 cm; stipules sericeous adaxially; staminate flowers solitary, on peduncles 5-6 mm long; staminate corolla with tube funnelform and lobes 14-15 mm long; 1500-2100 m in nothern Peru.....Agouticarpa spinosa p.p.

          7'. Leaf blades papyraceous to chartaceous, subcoriaceous, or coriaceous; stipules glabrous adaxially; staminate flowers in cymes of 3-19, on pedicels 4-19 mm long; corolla with tube cylindrical and lobes 15-35 mm long; 0-2400 m, Costa Rica to Bolivia. 

               8. Leaf blades obtuse to usually acute or acuminate at apex; staminate corolla usually 5-merous but sometimes 4- or 6-merous, rather thin-textured, with tube 15-28 mm long and ca. 5 mm in diameter; wet forest at 0-2400 m in the western Amazon drainage, in southern Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Boliva....Agouticarpa isernii

               8'. Leaf blades rounded to obtuse, acute, or shortly acuminate at apex; staminate corolla consistently 6-merous, fleshy, with tube 22-40 mm long and 4-10 mm in diameter; wet forest at 0-2650 m in Costa Rica, Panama, western Colombia, and western to central Ecuador....Agouticarpa williamsii