Helichrysum pallidum Dc.

Perennial herb, rootstock stout, woody, roots producing narrow tubers, flowering stem usually solitary, up to 650 mm tall, often much shorter, leafy in lower half becoming pedunculoid upwards, thinly woolly. Radical leaves up to 400 x 120 mm, up to 2/3 of the length petiolar, blade broadly to narrowly elliptic, gradually contracted to the long, flat petiole-like base, expanded and clasping below, apex acute to acuminate, margins often undulate, upper surface harshly pubescent, sometimes lightly cobwebby at first, lower thinly greyish-white felted, 5-7-nerved, tertiary nerves scalariform, raised or not, but clearly visible; cauline leaves similar, becoming sessile and cordate-clasping upwards and passing into distant bracts. Heads homogamous, campanulate, ±6-7 mm long and as broad, many in a compact, flat-topped corymb. Involucral bracts in ±4 series, subequal, closely imbricate, equalling the flowers, backs woolly, tips ovate, subobtuse, creamy to pale yellow, sometimes washed palest brown, more or less opaque, scarcely radiating. Receptacle with fimbrils at least equalling the ovaries. Flowers 18-34. Achenes not seen, ovaries glabrous. Pappus bristles many, scabrid, bases lightly fused.