Rigid, densely divaricately branched shrublet up to 0.6(-1.0) m high, branches suberect to spreading, sparsely leafy and glaucous when young but later developing grey, fissured bark. Leaves alternate, suberect or ± spreading, rather distant, shortly petiolate, blade obovate to oblanceolate, 5-10(-12) x (1.5-)2.0-4.0 mm, obtuse to acute, plane or shallowly concave, leathery, glaucous, midrib weakly raised beneath, petiole 0.2-0.5 mm long. Inflorescence terminal on main and lateral branches, capitate, bracteate, ±15-30-flowered, branches becoming hard and thorny with age; involucral bracts 5, ovate, 10-11 x 5-6 mm, yellow ± flushed wine-red or entirely maroon, papery, faintly nervate, apiculate, subglabrous to densely sericeous, caducous and mostly fallen at flowering. Flowers chrome-yellow with maroon tube, unscented during day but strongly lilac-scented at night; pedicel ±1 mm long, densely appressed pubescent; hypanthium 13-18 mm long, circumscissile 4.5-6.0 mm from base, basal portion narrowly ovoid, densely sericeous with long, ascending, silvery to golden hairs 2-5 mm long, upper portion tubular but inflated and subglobular in distal 1.5 mm, densely appressed pubescent with straight, sericeous hairs ±1 mm long in lower portion but becoming villous with crisped hairs distally, especially on distal swelling; sepals 5, spreading, ovate, 4-5 x 2.0-2.5 mm, glabrous and waxy above but villous beneath, margins revolute and apex reflexed, thus apparently oblong-emarginate and ±1.5 mm wide. Petaloid scales 0. Stamens 4 + 4, subsessile; outer whorl inserted 0.5 mm below rim of hypanthium, half-exserted; inner whorl inserted at base of bulge ±1.5 mm within throat of hypanthium, fully included; anthers ±1 mm long at anthesis. Ovary ellipsoid and attenuate basally, ±2 mm long, sparsely sericeous; style inserted laterally, included and reaching less than halfway up hypanthium, ±4.5 mm long, stigma penicillate. Fruit not seen.
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