Tree to 35 m tall. Forming a lignotuber.Ironbark to small branches, dark grey or black.Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): stem rounded in cross-section; juvenile leaves sub-opposite to alternate, petiolate, linear, 2.5–10 cm long, 0.2–0.6(0.7) cm wide, dull grey-green to blue-grey.Adult leaves alternate, petiole 0.5–1 cm long; blade linear to narrowly lanceolate, 5–13 cm long, 0.4–1 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, concolorous, dull or rarely slightly glossy, green or sometimes bluish green, side-veins at an acute or sometimes wider angle to midrib, densely reticulate, intramarginal vein confluent with the margin, oil glands mostly intersectional and sparse.Inflorescence terminal compound or axillary compound or axillary single umbels, peduncles 0.5–1.1 cm long, buds 7 per umbel, pedicels 0.3–0.8 cm long. Mature buds narrowly ovoid to fusiform, 0.5–0.6 cm long, 0.2–0.3 cm wide, green to yellow, smooth, scar present, operculum conical, stamens usually irregularly flexed, anthers adnate, cuboid, dehiscing by broad lateral pores or slits, style long, stigma blunt or pin-head shaped, locules 3 or 4, the placentae each with 4 vertical ovule rows. Flowers white.Fruit pedicellate (pedicels 0.3–0.8 cm long), cup-shaped to truncate-globose, 0.4–0.6 cm long, (0.3)0.4–0.6 cm wide, usually longer than wide, disc level to descending, valves 3 or 4, usually visible near rim level.Seeds brown or grey, (1)1.8–2 mm long, ovoid or flattened-ovoid or pointed at one end, dorsal surface shallowly pitted, hilum ventral.Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): cotyledons reniform; stems square in cross-section; leaves always petiolate, opposite for 2–7 nodes then alternate, linear to linear-lanceolate, 5.5–8.7 cm long, 0.6–1 cm wide, base tapering, dull, green, discolorous. Seedling much branched.
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