Mallet to 10 m tall. Lignotuber absent. Bark wholly smooth, pinkish grey over whitish grey, shedding in scaly curls which may persist on scattered horizontal bark scars on the trunk. Branchlets with few or no oil glands in the pith. Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): stems rounded in cross-section; juvenile leaves always petiolate, alternate, 4–7 cm long, 1.5–3 cm wide, blue-green to green. Adult leaves alternate, petioles 0.8–1.7 cm long; blade lanceolate, 5–10 cm long, 1–2 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, margin entire, apex acute, concolorous, dull, green, side-veins greater than 45° to midrib, reticulation moderate to dense, intramarginal vein well in from margin, oil glands island and intersectional. Inflorescence axillary unbranched, peduncles widening apically, 1–1.8 cm long, buds ?9 to 15, pedicellate (pedicels 0.2–0.4 cm long). Mature buds fusiform and sometimes slightly curved (1.1–1.5 cm long, 0.25–0.4 cm wide), scar present, operculum conical and attenuate, about twice as long as the hypanthium and equal to it in width at the join, few outer stamens erect, most stamens variably deflexed, anthers oblong, versatile, dorsifixed, dehiscing by longitudinal slits, style long and straight, stigma blunt to tapered, locules 3(4), the placentae each with 4 vertical rows of ovules. Flowers creamy white to pale yellow. Fruit pedicellate (0.2 cm long), cylindrical to barrel-shaped, 0.6–0.8 cm long, 0.4–0.6 cm wide, disc descending vertically, valves 3(4), near rim level. Seeds pale brown to straw coloured, 0.7–1.7 mm long, sub-spherical to cuboid, surface smooth, hilum ventral/terminal. Cultivated seedlings (measured at node 10): cotyledons Y-shaped (bisected); stems rounded to square in cross-section, smooth to slightly warty; leaves always petiolate, opposite for 3 or 4 nodes then alternate, ovate, 4–7.5 cm long, 1.8–3 cm wide, margins irregular with warts, dull green, becoming glossy at upper nodes.
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