Shrubs or trees to 4.5 m tall. One-year-old branchlets purplish brown, thin, glabrous, shiny. Petiole 3-5 mm; leaf blade elliptic or ovate-elliptic, 2.5-4(-4.5) × 1.5-2(-2.5) cm, abaxially greenish or grayish blue, at first pubescent, glabrescent, villous along midvein when young, adaxially green, base rounded, margin entire, apex acute. Male catkin to 4-6 cm × 6-10 mm; bracts obovate, ca. 1.5 mm, pilose. Male flower: adaxial gland 1, rarely 2, narrowly ovate, ca. 0.4 mm, rarely divided, abaxial gland sometimes present and small; stamens 2, distinct; filaments ca. 4.3 mm, base downy; anthers yellow, globose. Female catkin (in young fruit) 2.5-4 cm × 4-5 mm; peduncle short or absent; leaflets caducous or none; bracts obovate, ca. 1/2 as long as ovary, abaxially villous, long ciliate, adaxially subglabrous. Female flower: gland adaxial, 0.4-0.5 mm, shortly ligulate; ovary ovoid, ca. 2.2 mm, villous or glabrous, shortly stipitate; style short; stigma 4-lobed. Capsule subglobose, ca. 3 mm, pilose; stipe conspicuous. Fl. May-Jun, fr. Jul.

Similar to Salix hylonoma but leaf blade entire, whitish abaxially; filaments free; style and stigma short; ovary ovoid, stipitate in fruit. Similar also to S. heterochroma but catkins short, thin; glands longer; capsule shortly stipitate.

* Mountain slopes. Gansu, Qinghai, Shaanxi