Stem: The trunks are well developed, often sprouting from the bases to form clumps. The trunk is erect but usually leaning to some extent, up to 3 m tall and about 350 mm thick, covered with the usual geometrical pattern of old leaf bases, and the crown is covered with dense brown wool. Leaves: The leaves are of medium length, 1100-1500 mm long, rigid, usually straight but sometimes slightly arched, and dark glossy green. The petioles (leaf stalks) are thornless, hairless, and short at 20-100 mm long. The leaflets at the basal end of the leaf are progressively reduced in size towards the base of the leaf with the lowermost in the form of prickles. The leaflets situated at about the middle of the leaf are pointed towards the apex of the leaf at an angle of about 60 degrees with the leaf axis (rachis), opposing leaflets are placed with an angle of about 90 degrees between them, they are spaced 15-25 mm apart, not overlapping or with the lower margin slightly overlapping the upper margin of the leaflet below it when viewing the upper surface. The leaflets are hard in texture, narrowly ovate, without teeth or with teeth on both margins, with the apices ending in sharp and hard spines. The leaflets are 140-170 mm long and 16-20 mm wide. Cones: The male cones are on stalks up to 70 mm long, 2 to 4 per stem, very narrowly egg-shaped, appearing hairless, pale yellow, and 300-400 mm long and 110-120 mm across. The exposed faces of the cone scales are rhombic, and drawn out into prominent drooping beaks towards their terminal face which is the only facet to be clearly defined. The female cones are sessile (i.e. not stalked), egg-shaped, one to two per stem, initially greenish yellow but turning brighter yellow as they become mature but with the colour to a greater or lesser extent masked by a cloak of brown, felt-like hair, and about 420 mm long and 220 mm across in the typical example measured. The exposed faces of the cone scale have poorly defined facets, are more or less raised towards the terminal facet, and warty. The seeds have a bright red sarcotesta (fleshy covering layer). Coning pattern: It seems as if coning takes place at more or less the same time as in species like E. natalensis and E. senticosus. In mid-April female cones appeared to be full-grown, but male cones had not yet shed pollen. It seems likely that the cones appear at the end of February or early March, that pollination takes place in early May, and that the seeds are released in October.
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