Trees small. Branches dark or reddish brown, shiny. Leaves of shoots with stipules semiorbicular, reniform, or auriculate, glandular serrate, caducous. Petiole 5-12 mm, glands sometimes leafletlike, pubescent when young, glabrescent, apex glandular; leaf blade elliptic or ovate to elliptic-lanceolate, 4-8 × 1.8-3.5(-4) cm, abaxially pale or grayish white, adaxially green, both surfaces glabrous, base cuneate, rarely rounded or cordate, margin glandular serrate or dentate, apex acute. Male catkin 4-5 cm; peduncle and rachis downy; bracts ovate, ca. 1 mm. Male flower: stamens often 5; filaments ca. 2 × as long as bracts, pilose at base; anthers yellow, globose. Female catkin 4-5.5 × ca. 1 cm; peduncle ca. 2 cm; rachis tomentose; bracts elliptic-obovate, ca. as long as or slightly shorter than stipe. Female flower: adaxial gland large, abaxial gland small, both connate at base forming a nearly lobed false disc; ovary narrowly ovoid, glabrous, long stipitate; stigma capitate or retuse. Capsule ovoid-ellipsoid, 3-7 mm. Fl. Apr, fr. May.

Below 1100 m. Hebei, Jiangsu, Liaoning, Shaanxi, Sichuan [Japan, Korea].