Herbs to 17 cm tall, perennial, rosulate. Rootstock yellow, obconic, ca. 2 cm in diam. Caudex densely covered with brown fibrous and lacerate leaf sheath residues. Stems few, unbranched, glabrous. Rosette leaves narrowly lanceolate, linear-lanceolate, linear-elliptic, or linear, to 15 × 0.2-0.6(-1.5) cm, glabrous, base attenuate, margin undulate, apex usually recurved and acuminate. Stem leaves 2 or 3, brown, scalelike, narrowly lanceolate to subulate-lanceolate. Capitulum solitary. Involucre campanulate to subglobose, to 2-2.5 × 1.5-2 cm in fruit. Phyllaries abaxially glabrous, apex acute to obtuse; outermost phyllaries triangular to ovate-triangular, to 7 × 2.5 mm. Florets yellow. Achene cylindric, ca. 1 cm, with smooth ribs, shortly villous. Pappus dirty yellow, ca. 1.2 cm. Fl. and fr. Apr-May. 2n = 14.