Sphaeranthus peduncularis Dc.

Aromatic, viscid herb up to 50(90) cm tall with ascending or diffuse branches; stems and branches ±winged with the wings up to c. 2 mm wide and from strongly dentate to denticulate, broken or deciduous in the older parts, pubescent or lanate on the younger parts. Leaves linear, oblong or narrowly oblong to lanceolate, up to c. 7 x 1.7 cm, obtuse to acute and mucronate to apiculate at the apex, decurrent into the stem-wings at the base, mucronate-dentate to denticulate at the margins, ±punctate, scabridulous to lanate-tomentose, glabrescent. Glomerules at the ends of the branches or axillary on ±stout peduncles up to c. 7 cm long but usually shorter, winged like the stem or wingless, depressed-hemispheric to conic-ovoid, up to 1.3 cm in diam.; receptacle from almost plane to ovoid or orbicular; several rows of the outer bracts forming a shallow cup and extending ±as high as the depressed glomerule, or shorter and only covering a portion of the lower part of the ovoid glomerule, up to 7 mm long or much shorter, ovate, broadly obovate or rarely lanceolate, apex strongly apiculate, ±densely pubescent, midrib often thickened, remainder of subtending bracts becoming more oblong upwards, or cuneate and ±emarginate, some apiculate. Capitula with 3-7 bracts with the laterals folded, oblong and truncate, c. 3 mm long, pubescent and ciliate at the margins, scarious and easily torn. Female florets 4 or sometimes as many as 10, up to c. 4 mm long, corolla narrowly tubular, glabrous; cypsela narrowly ellipsoid, c. 0.9 mm long, with circinate trichomes. Hermaphrodite florets 1-2, rarely 3, 4 mm long, narrowly funnel-shaped to cylindric, sparsely glandular or glabrous, lobes glandular, sterile.

It is a tropical plant.