Herbs, erect to spreading, annual, 1-2(-3) dm, tomentose, greenish to reddish. Stems: caudex absent; aerial flowering stems erect, not striated or angled, solid, not fistulose, 0.1-0.5 dm, tomentose. Leaves basal and cauline; basal: petiole 0.3-1 cm, floccose, blade lanceolate to obovate, 1-3(-4) × 1-1.5(-2) cm, tomentose abaxially, sparsely floccose to glabrate and grayish to greenish adaxially, margins entire or infrequently crenulate; cauline sessile, blade lanceolate to oblanceolate, 0.5-2 × 0.3-1 cm, similar to basal blade. Inflorescences cymose, open, 5-25 × 10-30 cm; branches tomentose; bracts 3, scalelike, 0.5-2.5 × 1-2 mm. Peduncles spreading, straight or nearly so, filiform, (0.5-)1-3 cm, glandular-puberulent. Involucres campanulate, 1-1.5(-2) × 1.5-3(-3.5) mm, glandular-puberulent; teeth 5, erect, 0.4-0.8 mm. Flowers 1-2.5 mm; perianth white to yellow, becoming pink or red, with a conspicuous rose-purple spot on each outer tepal, glandular-puberulent; tepals dimorphic, those of outer whorl elliptic to roundish or obovate, inflated from base to middle, those of inner whorl lanceolate; stamens included, 1-1.5(-2) mm; filaments pilose proximally. Achenes brown, 3-gonous, 1-1.5 mm, glabrous. 2n = 40.
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