[M. balsamina sensu auct., non L.; M. charantia var. abbreviata Ser.; Sicyos fauriei H. Lev.]
(nat) Balsam pear
Monoecious annual herbs; stems up to several m long, pubescent or glabrate. Leaves simple, broadly ovate in outline with a basal sinus, 4-10 cm long, 4-8 cm wide, deeply 5-lobed, the lobes ovate, margins dentate or lobulate, apex acute, petioles 3-5 cm long, tendrils unbranched. Staminate flowers on stalks 4-80 mm long, bracteate below the middle, bracts green, suborbicular, mucronate, 3-20 mm long, calyx lobes lanceolate, 4-6 mm long, petals yellow, obovate to spatulate, 10-12 mm long; pistillate flowers on stalks 2-70 mm long, bracteate as in staminate flowers, hypanthium ovoid, attenuate, muricate, 8- 30 mm long, stigmas papillate. Fruit orang- ish red, ovoid to ellipsoid, attenuate, 3-12 cm long (in wild plants), longitudinally ridged, warty, or with subconical spines, dehiscing irregularly as a 3-valved fleshy capsule with seeds encased in red pulp. Seeds pale brown, 8-16 mm long, margins undulate, the surface granular. [2n = 11, 22.] Native from tropical Africa to Australia; in Hawaii widely naturalized in disturbed sites, 0-300 m, on all of the main islands. First collected on 0‘ahu in 1909 (Faurie 877, P).— Plate 75.
The naturalized populations have been referred to var. abbreviata, characterized by the smaller, more warty fruit and smaller, less sharply cut leaves. The fruit and young shoots of the wild plants are edible only in small quantities. A cultivated form with much larger fruit is grown in Hawaii and is popular in Chinese and Filipino cooking.