Shrubs to 5 m tall. Branchlets blackish brown or grayish brown; juvenile branchlets pilose, glabrescent. Petiole 2-9(-15) mm, pilose; leaf blade oblong-elliptic, elliptic, long obovate-elliptic, or long elliptic-lanceolate, 2.5-6 × 1.5-2.5(-3) cm, abaxially greenish or whitish, adaxially green, both surfaces glabrous or downy at base of midvein, base rounded or attenuate, margin entire, apex rounded or slightly acute, rarely retuse. Flowering coetaneous. Catkins 2.5-3.5(-4) cm × 4-6 (-7) mm; peduncle short, with 2 or 3 leaflets; rachis villous; bracts yellowish green, obovate or suborbicular, abaxially villous or glabrous distally, adaxially glabrous or subglabrous, long ciliate, apex subrounded or shallowly dentate. Male flower: adaxial gland ovate-terete, 1/2 to ca. as long as bracts, abaxial gland smaller or absent; stamens 2; filaments free, villous proximally. Fruiting catkin to 5.5 cm. Female flower: adaxial gland 1(or 2), ca. as long as bracts; ovary ovoid or ovoid-conical, glabrous or pilose at base, shortly stipitate; style conspicuous; stigma 2-lobed. Capsule ca. 3 mm, glabrous. Fl. Apr-May, fr. Jun.

* Along rivers, mountain slopes; 2500-4300 m. W Sichuan, E and S Xizang.