Shrubs 1-3 m tall, glabrous; branchlets longitudinally angulate, sparsely lenticellate. Leaves alternate; stipules small, gland-shaped, ca. 0.5 mm; petioles 2-5 mm, eglandular; leaf blade ovate, ovate-lanceolate, or lanceolate, rarely elliptic, 5-13 × 0.8-6 cm, papery, base attenuate, sometimes obtuse, margins densely acutely glandular-serrate, apex acuminate or long acuminate to caudate-acuminate; midvein elevated on both surfaces, lateral veins 6-10. Flowers unisexual, monoecious and androgynous in terminal and axillary 2.5-6 cm racemes, female in lower part, male in upper part. Male flowers: pedicels short; bracts broadly ovate or triangular, ca. 1.3 × 1.5 mm, apex acute, base bilateral, each with 1 rotund gland, each bract with 2 or 3 flowers; sepals 3, lanceolate, ca. 1.2 × 0.6-0.8 mm; stamens 3; anthers globose, longer than filaments. Female flowers: pedicels short; bracts ovate, ca. 2.5 × 1.5 mm, aristate at apex, acumen to 1.5 mm, base bilateral, each with 1 rounded gland; bractlets 2, oblong, ca. 1.5 cm, apex irregularly 3-serrulate; sepals 3, slightly connate at base, ovate, ca. 1.5 × 1.2 mm, apex acute, margins serrulate; ovary globose, ca. 1.5 mm in diam. Capsules subglobose, triangular, ca. 1 cm in diam. Seeds ovoid, gray-black when dry, smooth, ca. 4 mm in diam.

Montane forests and thickets, along rivers and streams in bushlands; 1200-3000 m. Gansu, Guangzhou, Hubei, Hunan, Sichuan, Yunnan [India, Nepal].