Tree to 35 m tall. Lignotuber absent, epicormic buds present. Bark smooth except for some loose rough grey, black or brown bark at base of trunk; smooth bark white, cream, yellow, brown, green or grey, horizontal black scars usually present on trunk, often ribbons of decorticated bark hang in the upper branches. Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): stem square in cross-section and prominently winged, not or only slightly glaucous; juvenile leaves opposite, sessile for many pairs, ovate to lanceolate, 5–12.5 cm long, 1.7–4.5 cm wide, margin entire or crenulate, blue-green or green. Adult leaves alternate, petiole 1.5–3.1 cm long; blade lanceolate to falcate, 13–25 cm long, 1.4–2.5 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, margin toothed, concolorous or slightly discolorous, glossy, green, side-veins usually acute, sometimes at a wider angle to the midrib, moderately to densely reticulate, intramarginal vein parallel to and remote from the margin, oil glands few, island; new growing tips red-brown, not glaucous. Inflorescence axillary unbranched, peduncles 0.6–1.5 cm long, buds 7 per umbel, sessile or on pedicels to 0.2 cm long. Mature buds oblong to ovoid to fusiform, ca 0.5 cm long, ca 0.3 cm wide, green or red, smooth, angled longitudinally, scar absent, outer operculum held and splitting at apex with inner operculum showing through it as bud grows, conical to rounded, stamens inflexed or irregularly flexed, anthers cuboid to oblong, versatile, dorsifixed, dehiscing by longitudinal slits (non-confluent), style long, stigma blunt, locules 3 or 4, the placentae each with 4 vertical ovule rows. Flowers white. Fruit sessile or pedicellate (pedicels 0–0.2 cm long), cup-shaped, barrel-shaped or cylindrical, 0.5–0.7 cm long, 0.4–0.6 cm wide, may be faintly angled longitudinally, disc descending, valves 3 or 4, exserted, or near rim level. Seeds black, brown, or grey, 1.5–2.5 mm long, ovoid or flattened-ovoid, lacunose, dorsal surface pitted (shallowly), hilum ventral. Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): cotyledons bilobed; stems square in cross-section and winged, glaucous; leaves opposite and sessile for many nodes, cordate, 4–10 cm long, 2–4 cm wide, amplexicaul, margin entire, apex pointed, dull, glaucous or blue-green.
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