Tree to 20 m tall. Forming a lignotuber.Ironbark to small branches, grey or black, sometimes smooth-barked on branches smaller than 12 cm diameter.Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): stems square or round in cross-section; juvenile leaves always petiolate, alternate, ovate to broadly lanceolate, 6.5–10(15) cm long, 2–3 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, slightly discolorous, dull, bluish-green.Adult leaves alternate, petiole 1.5–2.7 cm long; blade lanceolate to broadly lanceolate to falcate, 9–15 (23) cm long, 1.5–3.5 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, concolorous, dull or rarely glossy, grey-green, side-veins usually greater than 45° to midrib, densely to very densely reticulate, intramarginal vein parallel to and just within margin, oil glands sparse and mostly intersectional.Inflorescence terminal compound and sometimes axillary single umbels also, peduncles 1–2.5 cm long, buds usually 7 per umbel, pedicels 0.5–1 cm long. Mature buds diamond-shaped, sometimes with four longitudinal ridges on the hypanthium, 0.8–1.4 cm long, 0.5–0.6 cm wide, scar present, operculum conical, sometimes slightly beaked, stamens irregularly flexed, anthers adnate, cuboid, dehiscing by lateral pores or slits, style long, stigma blunt, locules usually 4, the placentae each with 4 vertical ovule rows. Flowers white.Fruit on pedicels 0.3–0.9 cm long, cup-shaped or obconical, 0.7–1 cm long, 0.7–0.1 cm wide, disc descending, valves usually 4, near rim level.Seeds brown, 1.5–2 (2.2) mm long, ovoid or flattened-ovoid, dorsal surface smooth or shallowly pitted, hilum ventral. Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): cotyledons oblong to reniform; stems square in cross-section; leaves always petiolate, opposite for 2 or 3 nodes then alternate, leaves on lower stem ovate to broadly lanceolate, becoming narrower further up the stem, 6.5–10 cm long, 1.4–3.6 cm wide, base tapering, apex pointed, margin entire, discolorous, dull blue-green above, paler beneath.
Home