Mendoncia lasiophyta, Leonard, Bot. Mus. Leafl. Harvard Univ. 16: 92, pl. xv. 1953. Type collected in the vicinity of Leticia, on the Río Amazonas, Comisaría de Amazonas, Colombia, November 1948, by Richard Evans Schultes & Francisco López, No. 10400K (US, 1989479). Isotype: US 1989478.
Mendoncia lasiophyta is a rampant liana, clambering over grasses and low shrubs. The leaf blades are large, orbicular or suborbicular, and firm, but somewhat papery, and the lanceolate bracts, up to 4 cm. long are, like the stout peduncles, clothed with a dense yellowish brown tomentum. The corollas, exserted for about half their length beyond the bracts, are red. The specific epithet, derived from Xáscos,
shaggy, and purov, plant, alludes to the densely fulvous-tomentose inflorescence, leaves, and stems. Its closest relative is M. gigas Lindau, of Peru.