Tree to 20 m tall. Forming a lignotuber.Bark smooth throughout, seasonally powdery, white to cream and pinkish, shedding in thin patches.Branchlets lack glands in the pith; non-glaucous, smooth.Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): stems rounded in cross-section, scabrid only on the lowest internode; juvenile leaves always shortly petiolate, opposite, usually ovate, only becoming lanceolate after ca 0.4–0.5 m of growth, (3)5–15.5 cm long, 2–6.5 cm wide, base rounded to tapering, apex blunt or pointed, lower leaves green-grey, becoming yellow-green at higher nodes; only the lowermost leaves scabrid with bristle-glands and then only on underside.Crown predominantly of alternate adult leaves, with few pairs opposite.Adult leaves alternate, petioles 0.5–2(2.5) cm long; blade lanceolate or falcate, 5–16.5 cm long, 0.7–3.2 cm wide, flat or twisted to undulate, base tapering to petiole, margin entire, apex pointed, concolorous, glossy, green to yellow-green, side-veins at greater than 45° to midrib, reticulation dense to very dense, intramarginal vein present, oil glands apparently absent.Inflorescence axillary compound, with rhachis internodes very shortened (condensed), peduncles ± rounded, 0–0.4 cm long, buds usually in 3s on side-branches of inflorescence and in 7s terminally, pedicels 0.2–0.5 cm long. Mature buds obovoid to pyriform, 0.6–0.7 cm long, 0.5–0.6 cm wide, ?smooth, whitish but not waxy nor scurfy, scar present (outer operculum shed early, whole or in scaly fragments), operculum shallowly rounded, stamens inflexed, all fertile, anthers oblong, dorsifixed, versatile, dehiscing by longitudinal slits, style long and straight, stigma ± blunt, locules 3, the placentae each with ca 5 vertical ovule rows, but the rows ± indistinct. Flowers white.Fruit usually pedicellate (pedicels (0)0.2–0.6 cm long), cupular to ± cylindrical but widest at rim, (0.8)0.9–1.3 cm long, (0.6)0.7–0.9 cm wide, thin walled, disc descending vertically or obliquely, valves 3, enclosed or at rim level.Seeds brown, 4–6 mm long, saucer-shaped, smooth, hilum ventral. Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): cotyledons large, orbicular-reniform; stems rounded in cross-section, setose with bristle-glands of variable density and length; leaves always petiolate (petioles to 0.9 cm), opposite for at least 17 nodes, ovate, 5–10 cm long, 1.8–5 cm wide, base rounded or tapering, dull, grey-green to mid-green, setose on underside only near midrib or glabrous.
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