[3][4] The slender erect perennial shrub typically grows to a height of 1 to 3 metres (3 to 10 ft)[5] and has angular branchlets with silver scales present on young growth.

The later form fruit with five smooth sections that are shortly beaked having a length of 3 mm (0.12 in) containing flat oval seeds.

[2] The shrub is found along creeks and swamp areas in areas along the coast in the Swan Coastal Plain, Peel, South West and Great Southern regions of Western Australia from between Yanchep to just east of Albany[6] where it grows well in black peaty sandy soils.

[5] The species was first described as Phebalium anceps by the botanist Augustin Pyramus de Candolle in 1824 in the work Prodromus Systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis.

In 1825 it was reclassified as Eriostemon anceps by Kurt Polycarp Joachim Sprengel in Systema Vegetabilium.