Where found:

• Lowland forest, only in sedimentary hill country south of about Tangarakau

• Tall tree with spreading branches, trunk up to 1m diameter
  
• Small (10-15mm x 5-10mm), alternate, tough, leathery, dark green shiny leaves that have smooth margins, the margins are rolled towards the underside of the leaf
  
• Tiny bright red flowers, one of the most profusely flowering beeches, flowering from September to December
  
• Nuts up to 7mm long
  
• Bark of a young tree is pale and smooth, bark on an older tree is dark, furrowed and flaky and often covered with a thick black fungus
  
• Hybridises with hard beech at Tangarakau