Erect short-lived perennial herb to 4 dm tall, laxly and usually sparsely branched; stems yellowish-green to brown, terete, finely striate, densely minutely puberulent. Leaves and lower bracts of inflorescence opposite; blades papy-raceous, narrowly elliptical, to 4.5 cm long and 1.0 cm wide, the base narrowly cuneate, the margins serrulate beyond widest part, the apex narrowly acute, the upper surface with sparse short coarse hairs, the lower surface sparsely puberulous and glandular punctate, the veins prominently trinervate from the base; petioles slender, to 1.5 cm long. Inflorescence a lax panicle with loosely cymose branches, the ultimate branches to 13 mm long, slender, minutely puberulous. Heads ca. 4 mm high with ca. 25 florets; involucral bracts ca. 25, subimbricate, unequal, in 2-3 series, mostly bicostate, narrowly acute with narrow scarious margins, the outer bracts with long-attenuate tips; corolla white to lavender, 1.5-2.0 mm long with short hairs on the lobes; style branches usually slender. Achenes narrowly oblong with nearly equal constrictions above and below, black when mature with black ribs, scabrid or with short bristles mostly on the ribs; pappus of ca. 25 slender scarcely contiguous to slightly noncontiguous bristles.
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