Sturdy biennial or perennial rosette herb, the solitary flowering stem 0.6-2.4 m high, woody at base, unbranched except for the inflorescence; stem pubescent and scabrid. Leaves of two kinds: radical leaves petiolate, the petiole 5-10 cm long, the blade elliptic or oblanceolate, 30-60 cm long, 7-12.5 cm wide, base cuneate and decurrent, margins coarsely and irregularly dentate, apex acute, scabrid above with tubercle-based hairs, pubescent to tomentose beneath; cauline leaves smaller and diminishing in size upwards, the proximal sessile, the more distal with cordate, auriculate and semi-amplexicaul base, otherwise similar to radical leaves, 2-32 cm long, 1-19 cm wide. Capitula 5-9 mm long, heterogamous, in fairly dense terminal corymbs arranged in their turn in large leafy corymbs or panicles; stalks of individual capitula 1-3 mm long; phyllaries linear-lanceolate, 2-5(-8) mm long, acute, the outer pubescent, the inner ciliate. Florets yellow; outer florets few, tube filiform, 3-3.6 mm long and distally glandular, lobes 0.2-0.4 mm long and glandular, style 3.2-4.2 mm long; inner florets many, tube narrowly infundibuliform with a slightly widened base, 3.3-4.2 mm long, lobes 0.4-0.5 mm long and glandular, anthers 1.7-1.8 mm long, style 4-5 mm long. Achenes cylindric, 1.2-2 mm long, sparsely pilose; pappus 2.5-4 mm long.
Herb, up to 1.5 m high, thickly glandular with brown hairs. Basal leaves elliptic, unequally auriculate, dentate; becoming smaller upwards, sessile, lanceolate. Flowers yellow.