Annual (or sometimes biennial) erect herb, to c. 65 cm tall (rarely to 1.2 m), sparsely leafy, branching slightly near the base of the stem or unbranched, stems glabrous, striate. Leaves narrowly lanceolate to elliptic, grey-green, 27-90 x 2.5-23 mm; apex acute to obtuse; base narrowly to broadly amplexicaul, glaucous; margins entire or occasionally coarsely toothed. Capitula few (4) to many (8-12) in a lax corymb, homogamous, discoid, with 12-30 florets, diameter 4-7 mm (at apices of involucral bracts); peduncles glabrous, 5-46 mm long (branch nearest capitula). Involucre campanulate, bracts 5, 6 or 7 (rarely 4), 5-7 x 1.5-3.5 mm, green with purple tips, narrowly scarious, glabrous. Disc florets lilac, pale-purple or white; florets 11-31, much longer than the involucre, 5.5-9 mm long, corolla lobes 1.4-1.7 mm long, glandular, tubes c. 2.5-4 mm long. Stamens: anthers 2.5-3 mm long including sharply acute appendage, bases rounded to slightly caudate, filament collars balusterform. Style arms 0.7-1 mm long, apex rounded to conical with central tuft of sweeping hairs and fringing papillae. Cypselas cylindrical, dark (red-)brown with short white duplex hairs on ribs, 4-6 mm long. Pappus white, scabrid with bristles, 4.5-6 mm long.
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