Tufted annual to 8 cm high, 2-5 cm diam. Leaves 10-35 mm long, to 1 mm wide. Capitula usually on accrescent scapes up to 7 cm long in fruit; bracts 4-8, spreading, ovate to lanceolate, distinct from leaves, 2-4 mm long, subequal, forming a false whorl. Male flowers 2-5 per capitulum; anther oblong, c. 0.6 mm long, purple, caducous; filament to 2 mm long. Female flowers 10-25, densely packed in a dome-shaped cluster; stigmatic hairs 3-6, c. 1 mm long, caducous. Fruit obovoid-trigonous, c. 0.5 mm long, opaque, reddish, breaking from stipe when ripe and the 3 faces splitting from the vascular ribs but remaining attached at apex. Seed honeycombed, 0.4 mm long, brown.
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