Shrubs to 2 m tall. Branchlets with many nodes and short internodes; 2- and 3-year-old branchlets greenish brown; 1-year-old branchlets brownish black; juvenile branchlets pilose, glabrescent. Petiole 4-8 mm, densely dirty pubescent; leaf blade obovate-oblong, obovate-elliptic, or elliptic, 1.8-4.5 × 1-2 cm, abaxially greenish, at first white villous, glabrescent, or villous along midvein, adaxially dull green, rarely sparsely pubescent, base rounded, margin entire or indistinctly glandular dentate, apex rounded or apiculate; lateral veins (7-)10-13 on each side of midvein. Flowering precocious. Male catkin ellipsoid to shortly terete, yellow or brownish yellow, sessile, with 1 or 2 scalelike leaflets at base; bracts brown, obovate or oblong, ca. 1/2 as long as filaments, abaxially yellow or white long pubescent, adaxially glabrous, apex rounded-truncate, sometimes dentate. Male flower: adaxial and abaxial glands barred, ca. 1/3 as long as bracts; stamens 2; filaments distinct, basally downy; anthers yellow, red in distal part of catkin. Fruiting catkin shortly pedunculate; bracts as in male catkin, ca. as long as ovary or slightly shorter. Female flower: gland adaxial; ovary ovoid or long ovoid, 1.5-2 mm, white downy, sessile; style conspicuous, 2-lobed; stigma entire or divided. Capsule conical-ovoid, ca. 4 mm, pilose. Fl. May-Jun, fr. Jul.

* Mountain slopes, thickets; 3000-4000 m. SW Sichuan, NW Yunnan