Tarhapapaija – Carica papaya

Stem is cylindrical, 10-30 cm in diameter, straight, with prominent leaf scars, usually unbranched unless lopped or injured. The leaves are alternate, long-petiolate, 50-70 cm in diameter, palmately lobed, with 7-11 lobes, lobes glabrous, toothed. Plants can be male, female, or bisexual. Male flowers are in drooping axillary panicles to 80 cm long, with 5-lobed green calyx and 5-lobed cream to yellow corolla. Female flowers are solitary or cymose in axils or below leaves, with 5 yellow nearly free petals to 5 cm long. Occurrence of bisexual flowers depends on the season or age of the tree. Fruit is a large yellow to greenish-orange hollow berry, oblong to nearly globose or pear-shaped, up to 45 cm long. Fruit pulp is orange and juicy. The central cavity of the fruit has numerous rounded blackish seeds about 0.6 cm in diameter, each enclosed in a gelatinous aril. All parts of the plant contain white latex.