Annuals 8-40 cm tall. Roots yellow, fibrous. Stems dark purple, erect, striate, sometimes with ascending branches from lower and middle nodes. Leaves sessile, linear-lanceolate to lanceolate, 1.5-5 × 0.4-1.6 cm, base auriculate and subamplexicaul, margin ciliate, veins 1-3, strigose when young but becoming glabrous. Inflorescences panicles of cymes, many flowered, spreading. Flowers 5merous. Pedicel erect, to 1 cm, terete, with puberulent striae. Calyx tube campanulate, 2.5-3.5 mm, densely strigose outside; lobes triangular-lanceolate, margin ciliate, apex acuminate to acute, unequal, 3 larger and 7-11 mm, 2 smaller and 5-7 mm, midvein slender. Corolla pale blue to pale blue-purple, densely strigose outside; tube campanulate, 2.5-3.5 mm; lobes ovate-elliptic, 6-7.5 mm, margin ciliolate, apex acute. Nectaries 1 per corolla lobe, oblong and opening toward base of corolla, with a narrow scale and few divisions. Filaments basally white, apically blue, flattened subulate, 4.5-5.5 mm, basally much enlarged and connate; anthers blue, ellipsoid, 1-1.2 mm. Style 1.5-2 mm, slender; stigma lobes capitate. Capsules ovoid-ellipsoid, 5-6 mm. Seeds pale yellow, ellipsoid, 1-1.2 mm; seed coat smooth. Fl. and fr. Aug-Sep.
Open slopes, meadows, shrubland, rocky areas; at elevations from 3,000-5,000 metres.
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