Dioecious glabrous herb or subshrub, 1-2.5 m tall; stems long, often straggling at the base, brittle and juicy above, up to 2 cm ø, smelling like ginger-root; branches often drooping; upper internodes often condensed, particularly in young plants so that petiolar sheaths overlap. Leaves lanceolate to linear-oblong, 9-22 by 1.5-4 cm, thin, long acuminate at the apex, narrowly cuneate at the base, the margins rather closely serrate, the serrations apically thickened, more or less obtuse; lateral nerves 20-30 pairs, fine, ± raised; petioles 0.6-2(-3.5) cm, longer on one side, each pair joined to form a sheath 6-15 by 6-8 mm. Male flowers few in panicles, the floral axes 2-4.3 cm, the stalks c. 1 cm; very young flowers cone-like, about 1 cm long with a basal oblique ring 6 mm wide of c. 13 acute or bifid bractlets; stamens about 300, anther locule 1.2 mm (2 mm in vivo) long, the connective appendage compressed, acute, 0.5-1 mm long, asymmetrically incurved. Female inflorescences green, paniculate, c. 5 by 2 cm, the few branches 1-1.5 cm, ± few-flowered; bracts rounded ovate, c. 5-6 by 5 mm with a long caudate apex 3-6 mm long, c. 1 mm wide; sepals 3, triangular, 1-1.2 mm long and wide, entire, crenate or ± dentate. Ovary somewhat 3-angled, genuinely monocarpellate; stigma greenish with red tips, essentially lanceolate in outline, 2-2.2 mm long, irregularly lobulate, covered with several-celled hairs; tip of ovary with triangular impressed area with mammillate centre. Fruit ellipsoid, 3-4 mm long, ± 3-angled, crowned by the calyx.
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Herbs or subshrubs to 2 m tall, dioecious. Stems erect, glabrous. Petiole 0.5-2 cm, basal sheath cupular or tubular, membranous, 8-10 mm, apex truncate; leaf blade narrowly lanceolate,10-23 × 1.5-4 cm, membranous or papery, glandular mucronate, pale yellow abaxially when dry, olive green adaxially when dry, base cuneate, margin densely serrulate, apex graduallyangustate becoming caudate; midvein prominent abaxially, curved adaxially; lateral veins 15-22 pairs. Male spikes 3-5, clustered at apex of branches, pedunculate, 1.5-3.5 cm excluding peduncle at anthesis; bracts 0.8-1.2 cm; stamen 1; filament absent; anther oblong, ca. 2 mm, connective with a projected, acute appendage at apex, 0.7-1 mm. Femaleinflorescences terminal or axillary, branches few, 1.5-5 cm, ca. 2 cm wide; bracts large, 0.8-1.2 cm, with many small, orange-yellow spots. Drupes green, subellipsoid-trigonous, ca. 4 mm;apical part of bracts tightly adnate to fruit, elongated into a long beak. Fl. Dec-Mar, fr. Feb-Jun.
Forest on dacite hillside, in ridge forest and foot of wet cliff, with conifers and Fagaceae, 1000-2365 m. Fl. March-April, Jr. March-July.
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