Tree to 25 m tall; bark rough over whole trunk and branches, thick, hard, furrowed, black (ironbark). Juvenile leaves petiolate, opposite for few pairs then alternate, lanceolate, to 15 cm long, 2 cm wide, green to greyish-green; adult leaves petiolate, alternate, lanceolate to narrowly lanceolate, 7–14 cm long, 1.2–1.8 cm wide, concolorous, dull, green to bluish-green; reticulation dense, fine. Inflorescences axillary, unbranched; peduncles to 2 cm long, 7–11-flowered; buds pedicellate, broadly fusiform, to 1.2 cm long, 0.5 cm diam., no scar (2 opercula intact); operculum conical to beaked; stamens inflexed with outer staminodes; anthers adnate, cuboid; ovules in 4 vertical rows; flowers white, pink or red. Fruit pedicellate, truncate-globose, to 1.1 cm long, 1 cm diam.; staminal ring broad and deciduous; disc descending; valves usually 5, below rim; seed brown, irregularly ovoid and slightly flattened, surface shallowly reticulate, hilum ventral. Flowers May–Oct.
Wim, VVP, VRiv, GipP, OtP, Gold, CVU, DunT, NIS, HSF, HNF. Also SA (sparingly established), Qld, NSW. In Victoria confined to the Chiltern area, northern Warby Range and south of Winton, while the other ironbark, Eucalyptus tricarpa, with its 3-budded inflorescences and larger fruit is widespread.
