Plants spreading to ascending, 0.5-1.5 × 0.5-3 dm, thinly pubes-cent. Leaves basal; petiole 0.5-2 cm; blade oblanceolate, 0.5-2.5 × 0.3-0.8 cm, thinly pubescent. Inflorescences with involucres in dense clusters 1-2 cm diam., yellowish green; bracts 2, without whorl of sessile bracts about midstem, usually leaflike, oblanceolate, 0.5-1.5 cm × 1.5-3 mm, gradually reduced and becoming scalelike at distal nodes, linear, aciculate, acerose, 0.3-0.8 cm × 1-2 mm, awns straight, 1-2.5 mm. Involucres 3-10+, yellowish green, urceolate, slightly ventricose basally, 3-4.5 mm, slightly corrugate, without scarious or membranous margins, thinly pubescent; teeth spreading, unequal, 1-3 mm; awns straight or uncinate with longer anterior one straight or slightly curved, mostly 2 mm, others uncinate, 0.5-1.5 mm. Flowers exserted; perianth bicolored with floral tube greenish white to white and the lobes white to pinkish, cylindric, 5-6 mm, sparsely pubescent; tepals connate 2/ 3 their length, dimorphic, obovate, those of outer whorl erect, slightly longer than those of inner whorl, 2-lobed apically, those of inner whorl erect, 2-lobed, erose apically; stamens 9, included; filaments distinct, 5-5.5 mm, glabrous; anthers yellow to golden, oblong, 1-1.2 mm. Achenes brown, globose-lenticular, 3-3.5 mm. 2n = ca. 38.
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