Shrubs cushion-shaped; trunk dull brown, short, twisted, rooting. Branchlets yellowish brown; young branchlets dense, short; juvenile branchlets sparsely pubescent, glabrescent. Buds ovoid, small, glabrous. Leaves crowded, covering branchlets; petiole ca. 4 mm; leaf blade ovate, ca. 8 × 3.5(-5) mm, leathery, abaxially greenish, villous when young, adaxially green, glabrous, wrinkled, shiny, base cuneate, margin with loosely and regularly spaced, glandular saw teeth, apex acute; midvein raised abaxially, impressed adaxially. Catkins very small, ca. 5-flowered; bracts yellowish green, obovate, membranous, marginally and adaxially pubescent at base, apex rounded. Male flower: adaxial gland cylindric, abaxial gland thinner than adaxial gland, sometimes 2-lobed; stamens 2, ca. 3.5 mm, ca. 3 × as long as bracts; filaments pubescent at base; anthers yellow. Female flower: adaxial gland cylindric, nearly as long as stipe; ovary cylindric, ca. 3 mm, glabrous, ca. as long as bracts, long stipitate; style short, 2-parted; stigma 2-lobed. Capsule long ovoid. Fl. Jul, fr. Aug-Sep.

* Thickets, rock crevices; 4300-4800 m. E Xizang, NW Yunnan