Fibrous-rooted perennial from a very short, stout rhizome or crown; stems mostly solitary, 0.5–2 m, usually conspicuously spreading-hairy, at least below; lvs nearly all opposite, 3–8 pairs below the infl, commonly hairy on both sides, especially on the main veins beneath, lance-ovate to sometimes broadly ovate, mostly (1.3–)1.7–2.5(–3) times as long as wide, abruptly contracted to the petiole, the largest ones near the base, these commonly 6–20(–25) cm, toothed; petioles tending to be conspicuously wing-flared upward, often conspicuously spreading-hairy, the lower generally 1/3 to fully as long as the blade; heads several on long, naked peduncles in a corymbiform infl; disk red-purple, 1–1.5(–2) cm wide; invol bracts evidently imbricate, broad, firm, appressed, mostly oblong or elliptic, rounded to acutish, sometimes with an abrupt, very short acumination, 2.5–4(–5) mm wide, ciliolate, otherwise glabrous or nearly so; rays 10–15, 1–3 cm; pappus without accessory scales; 2n=34. Dry, open woods; basically Appalachian and Atlantic, from Va. and e. Ky. to c. Ga. and Ala., w. to w. Tenn. and se. La. July–Oct.
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