Shrubs, low, to 0.4 m, creeping from clumps, sometimes from thickened rootstocks. Stem segments not easily detached, pale green to deep green, graying with age, wrinkled when stressed, flattened, broadly obovate to ovate, 6.5-15 × 4-10 cm, tuberculate, glossy, glabrous; areoles 6-9 per diagonal row across midstem segment, oval, obovate, or subcircular, 2.5-5 × 1.5-4 mm; wool tan, aging brown. Spines 1-9 on most areoles to only on distal 1/2 of stem segment, white to gray with pale brown tips and bases, sometimes brown throughout; central spines 1-3, all deflexed or 1-2 porrect or ascending, terete or flattened, occasionally spirally twisted, 25-70 mm; small spines (2-)3-6(-8) strongly deflexed, usually slender, even bristlelike, 5-15 mm. Glochids forming a well developed adaxial tuft, yellow to brownish white, to 6 mm. Flowers: inner tepals yellow to gold, commonly darker to red near base, broadly spatulate, 30-40 mm, apiculate; filaments usually pale yellow; anthers yellow; style whitish to pale green; stigma lobes greenish. Fruits purple-red, oval to broadly ovate, subspheric or short ovoid, bases not narrowed, 30 × 20-25 mm, fleshy, base not narrowed, glabrous, spineless or nearly so; umbilicus deep; areoles 18-30. Seeds whitish to tan, irregularly shaped, flattened, 4-6 × 3-4 mm; girdle protruding 1-2 mm. 2n = 44, 66.
Grass-lands, pinyon-juniper-oak woodlands, sandy or shaley flats, rocky hills; at elevations from 1,400-1,800 metres.
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