Salix opaca Andersson ex Seemen.

Shrubs or trees to 8 m tall; bark yellowish brown, shiny. Branchlets tomentulose. Buds brown, tomentulose. Stipules lanceolate or narrowly ovate, ca. 1/2 as long as petiole, glabrous or pilose, margin dentate, apex acute; petiole ca. 3-8 mm, white pubescent; leaf blade broadly lanceolate or oblong-lanceolate, 6-15 × 1.5-3.5 cm, abaxially pale downy, when mature rarely subglabrous, adaxially dull green, silky pubescent, base cuneate, margin subentire, apex acute to acuminate. Flowering precocious or coetaneous. Male catkin cylindric, sessile or subsessile; rachis villous; bracts narrowly ovate, long pubescent, apex dark brown or nearly black. Male flower: adaxial gland ca. 1 mm; stamens 2, distinct, glabrous. Female catkin 3-3.5 × 0.7-1 cm. Female flower: ovary ovoid-conical 1.6-1.9 mm, villous, shortly stipitate; style 1-1.2 mm, glabrous; stigma 2-cleft, lobes recurved. Fl. May, fr. Jun.

According to C. V. B. Marquand & H. K. Airy Shaw (J. Linn. Soc., Bot. 48: 223. 1929), Salix opaca was found in Zêtang (SC Xizang); however, the authors have not seen the specimens.

Grown to protect embankments; used for making baskets.

Along rivers. Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning [Japan, Korea, Russia (Far East, E Siberia)]