Small trees or shrubs; monoecious. Bark grayish white, smooth. Branchlets pubescent when young, glabrescent, conspicuously lenticellate. Stipules lanceolate. Petiole 2-5 cm, pubescent; leaf blade broadly ovate to ± orbicular, sometimes lobed, 8-20 × 6-13 cm, thick papery, abaxially densely white or yellowish gray pubescent, adaxially scabrous, sparsely covered with short hairs, and basally pubescent along veins, base cordate to truncate and ± oblique, margin shallowly to coarsely serrate or basally entire and apically shallowly serrate, apex acute to shortly acuminate. Male catkins 3-5 cm. Female catkins 1-3 cm. Male flowers: calyx lobes yellowish green, narrowly ovate, adaxially pubescent; stamens 4; pistillode small. Female flowers: calyx lobes obovate, apically pubescent; styles short; stigmas without mastoidlike protuberance, 2-branched, abaxially pubescent. Syncarp white, red, or dark purple when mature, cylindric, 2-3 cm. Fl. Apr-May, fr. May-Jun.

Sunny slopes or valleys, high mountains; 900-1300 m. Anhui, N Fujian, N Guangdong, Hebei, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, S Jiangsu, S Shaanxi, Sichuan, NW Yunnan, Zhejiang [Japan, Korea].