Shrubs. Petiole short to almost absent; leaf blade very small, 8-20 mm at anthesis, elliptic, elliptic-lanceolate, or lanceolate, rarely broadly lanceolate to oblanceolate. Flowering precocious or coetaneous. Catkins cylindric, pedunculate (sometimes male catkin subsessile), with leaflets. Male flower: glands adaxial and abaxial; stamens 2, distinct. Female flower: adaxial gland only present; ovary ovoid or ovoid-conical, pilose, sessile; style conspicuous, 2-lobed to -cleft.