 Seedlings have bright obovate green cotyledons around long.Juvenile leaves are narrower, measuring long and wide, and often have serrate (toothed) margins.Although the inflorescences of "Banksia aquilonia" are similar to "B. integrifolia", the leaves are marked in their differences—the midrib on the leaves' undersides is distinctively covered in short reddish-brown hairs and the leaves are spirally arranged on the branches rather than in whorls as in all "B. integrifolia" subspecies.