Side by side

Osier or white willow? How to tell them apart

Salix viminalis · Salix alba

You can tell an osier by its very long, narrow leaves of 10–20 cm with smooth, slightly rolled edges and its long, pliable shoots; a white willow has shorter (5–10 cm), finely toothed leaves and becomes a large tree, or stands as a pollard.

Lay a leaf on your hand: on the osier it is long and narrow like a ribbon, up to 20 cm, with a smooth edge and a silky, silver-grey underside; on the white willow it is shorter and lance-shaped, finely toothed and silvery on both sides. The osier stays a shrub or small tree of 3–6 m, while the white willow reaches 15–25 m if left to grow freely.

Updated on 11 October 2026

Photo: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 · source

Osier Salix viminalis

Photo: GerardM at nl.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0 · source

White willow Salix alba

Osier and white willow side by side
	Osier	White willow
Leaves	Alternate, 10–20 cm long and 1–2 cm wide, untoothed with a slightly rolled-under edge; underside covered in silky, silver-grey hairs.	Alternate, lance-shaped, 5–10 cm, finely toothed; both sides (especially the underside) silky and silvery-hairy.
Flowering	Catkins in March–April, before the leaves (March–April).	Catkins in April; male and female on separate trees (April).
Fruit	Fluffy seeds in May.	Fluffy seeds in May–June.
Bark	Long, straight, pliable shoots, hairy at first, later glossy greenish-brown.	Grey and deeply furrowed in a network pattern.
Shape and height	Shrub, 3–6 m	Broadleaf tree, 15–25 m, often pollarded
Site	Full sun, any garden soil, moist to wet	Full sun, any garden soil, moist to wet
Native to Belgium	Yes	Yes
Good for bees, butterflies and birds	Yes, for bees, butterflies and birds	Yes, for bees, butterflies and birds
Poisonous to people and pets	Not known to be poisonous	Not known to be poisonous
Pruning months	December–March	November–March

The best feature in each season

Spring: The osier flowers in March–April, with catkins before the leaves, an early food source for bees; the white willow flowers a little later, in April.
Summer: The leaf decides it: long, narrow and smooth-edged on the osier, shorter and finely toothed on the white willow. From a distance a white willow looks silver-grey, an osier greener, flashing silver when the wind turns the leaves.
Autumn: After leaf fall you can see the long, straight rods of the year on the osier, up to 3 m if it has been coppiced. A pollarded white willow carries a crown of straight branches on a short, thick trunk.
Winter: Look at the trunk: the white willow has grey bark with deep, net-like furrows, often on a thick pollard; the osier remains a shrub with many thin, glossy greenish-brown shoots.

Where do they grow?

Both are native and grow along streams, ditches and rivers and in wet meadows. The osier used to be grown widely in osier beds for baskets and wickerwork. The white willow is the classic pollard of our ditches and pastures.

Which one for your garden?

The osier fits an ordinary garden with a wet corner: coppice it every one to three years and you will have rods each year for baskets, a woven fence or a living willow den.
As a free-growing tree the white willow is too big for an ordinary garden; as a pollard by a ditch, a pond or in a meadow it is superb for wildlife. Keep both well away from the house, sewers and drains: their roots seek out water.

Did you know? Willow bark contains salicin, the substance from which salicylic acid and later aspirin were developed. The white willow is called Salix alba in Latin, ‘white willow’, after its silvery leaves.

Read on

Also looks like

Identify by feature

All species that look alike