Herbs 30-100 cm tall, perennial. Taproot woody. Caudex often with residues of old leaf bases. Stem solitary, slender, erect, branched from near base or only apically, glabrous or very sparsely white tomentose, distantly leafy or more rarely almost leafless. Basal and lower stem leaves oblanceolate, elliptic, or narrowly elliptic, 2-19 × 0.5-4 cm, pinnatifid, pinnatipartite, or runcinately or lyrately so, both surfaces ± pubescent with pale brown hairs, base attenuate into a winged petiole-like portion; lateral lobes 2-7 pairs, opposite to obliquely opposite, ± broadly triangular to triangular-ovate, margin entire or sinuate-dentate, apex acute, long acute, obtuse, or rounded and often mucronate; terminal lobe lanceolate, triangular, or falcate, margin dentate or entire. Middle and upper stem leaves similar to lower ones but smaller, narrower, and divided or undivided; uppermost stem leaves reduced, undivided, and bractlike. Synflorescence corymbiform, with few to many capitula. Capitula with 9-16 florets; peduncle usually 0.5-3 cm, slender. Involucre cylindric, (0.8-)0.9-1.3 cm. Outer phyllaries broadly ovate to lanceolate, longest 1.5-2(-3) mm, apex acute; inner phyllaries ca. 8, abaxially glabrous, adaxially appressed hairy, midvein subapically crested or corniculate, margin white scarious, apex acute. Anther tube greenish. Style branches yellow upon drying. Achene dark brown to blackish, subfusiform, 3-4 mm, ribs finely spiculate, apex attenuate. Pappus white, 5-7(-9) mm. Fl. and fr. May-Sep. 2n = 32*.
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