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Perennial herb, with annual flowering shoots (10-)20-90 cm high from long fleshy taproot; root-crown(s) one to several, short-hairy to lanate; flowering stems one to several, greenish brown, slightly glaucous, often tinged with red, wiry, sparsely branched distally or densely branched, glabrous. Leaves 2-6, in basal rosettes, usually appearing after flowering, green, glaucous beneath with reddish midrib and margins, (ob-)lanceolate to obovate, linear when young, 3-25(-35) cm long, 0.5-7 cm wide, base cuneate into a winged pseudopetiole to 3 cm long, margins entire to dentate to pinnatilobed, apex obtuse or acute, glabrous. Capitula few to many, in dense or lax corymbs or panicles; stalks of individual capitula 0.5-4 cm long; involucre narrowly cylindric, 10-16 mm long, up to 19 mm in fruit; phyllaries erect, but eventually reflexed, green, often tinged red, the outer ovate and 1-6 mm long with scarious margins, becoming swollen at base, the inner linear-lanceolate, 8-19 mm long, acute or obtuse, with narrow scarious margins. Florets 6-25 per capitulum; corolla yellow, the ligule with faint pink stripe, the whole often becoming red or purple, tube narrowly cylindric, 6-10 mm long, pilose distally, ligule 3-8 mm long, 1-1.5 mm wide. Achenes red-brown, narrowly fusiform, 4-8 mm long, angular and finely ribbed, glabrous or minutely puberulous; pappus of white setae 7-10.5 mm long.
Acaulescent, cushion-like, perennial herb, with flowering stems up to 0.1-0.9 m high, with milky latex. Leaves in solitary rosettes, oblong to obovate, margins entire or aculeate-denticulate, glabrous, sometimes absent at flowering time. Capitula ligulate, solitary at tips of inflorescence branches, paniculate; involucral bracts imbricate, glabrous. Florets bisexual, corolla yellow. Flowering time Sept. Pappus of barbellate setae. Cypselae greyish green, narrowly subfusiform, somewhat compressed, finely ribbed.
Phyllaries green, often purple-tinged, mostly 2–3(4)-seriate, glabrous, occasionally puberulous outside, the inner often ciliolate about the apex, each usually with a short subapical wing-like glandular outgrowth on the midrib; outer phyllaries mostly 1–2-seriate imbricate, several extending onto the capitulum stalk, 2–3 mm. long, ovate to lanceolate, margins broadly hyaline; inner phyllaries c. 5, markedly longer than the outer, subequal, linear-lanceolate, accrescent, eventually reflexed.
Leaves in basal rosettes, usually appearing after the flowers, up to c. 25 x 4 cm., exceptionally to 35 x 5.5 cm., obovate or narrowly oblanceolate to subspathulate, linear when young, obtuse to acute at the apex, attenuate below, entire to callose-tipped denticulate or sometimes coarsely dentate-lobulate on the margins, glabrous.
Achenes 5–8 mm. long, narrowly subfusiform, somewhat 4–5-angular or ± compressed, finely 12–14-ribbed, glabrous or hispidulous, greyish-green; ribs often minutely barbellate, becoming narrowly spongy; pappus many-seriate of barbellate setae 7–10 mm. long.
A scapose strict wiry perennial herb up to c. 95 cm. tall, or sometimes a contracted small caespitose pulviniform herb 3–15 cm. high, often glaucous; taproot slender terete semi-woody; rootcrowns 1-several, usually shortly brown-lanate.
Scapes often purple-tinged below, 1-several, wiry, ± sparsely branched above, glabrous; or scapes much reduced, diffusely-branched and aggregated in dense clusters, c. 3–15 cm. tall.
Florets c. 6–12 per capitulum; corollas yellow, 13–15 mm. long, tube puberulous outside near the throat, ligule drying purplish c. 6–8 mm. long, lorate, glabrous.
Involucres in flowering capitula c. 12–15 x 2 mm. and very narrowly ovoid-cylindric, up to c. 19 x 3.5 mm. in mature capitula.
Capitula few to many, erect; capitula stalks bracteate, bracts ± ovate, lanate in the axils.
