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Species of tree

Salix babylonica (Babylon willow or weeping willow; ) is a species of willow native to dry areas of northern China, but cultivated for millennia elsewhere in Asia, being traded along the Silk Road to southwest Asia and Europe.

Salix babylonica is a medium to large sized deciduous tree, growing up to tall. It grows rapidly, but has a short lifespan, between 40 and 75 years. The shoots are Yellowish brown, with small buds. The leaves are alternate and spirally arranged, narrow, light green, long and broad, with finely serrate margins and long acuminate tips; they turn a gold yellow in autumn. The flowers are arranged in catkins produced early in the spring; it is dioecious, with the male and female catkins on separate trees.

Salix babylonica was described and named scientifically by Carl Linnaeus in 1736, who knew the species as the pendulous branched ("weeping") variant then recently introduced into the Clifford garden in Hartekamp in The Netherlands. A horticultural variant with twisted twigs and trunk, the corkscrew willow (S. matsudana var. tortuosa), is widely planted.

Salix babylonica, especially its pendulous branched ("weeping") form, has been introduced into many other areas, including Europe and the southeastern United States, but beyond China, it has not generally been as successfully cultivated as some of its hybrid derivatives, being sensitive to late spring frosts. In the more humid climates of much of Europe and eastern North America, it is susceptible to a canker disease, willow anthracnose (Marssonina salicicola), which makes infected trees very short lived and unsightly.