Plants mostly (2) 4–8 (13) dm tall and tall, round to spreading shrubs not scapose, thinly pubescent or glabrous and green, yellowish-green or infrequently grayish, occasionally papillate; stems spreading or prostrate, without persistent leaf bases, up to 1⁄3 height of plant when shrubby, the caudex stems absent or compact, the aerial flowering stems spreading or prostrate, slender, solid, not fistulose, (0.05) 0.1–0.8 dm long, thinly pubescent or glabrous; leaves cauline, 1 per node or fasciculate, the petioles 0.05–0.1 cm long, tomentose to floccose or glabrous, the blades linear to linear-oblanceolate, (0.5) 2–6 cm long, (0.03) 0.1–0.3 cm wide, densely to thinly white-tomentose abaxially, thinly so or glabrous and green adaxially, the margins tightly revolute; inflorescences cymose, usually compact, (0.1) 2–12 (15) cm long, (1) 4–15 (30) cm wide, the branches dichotomous, thinly pubescent or glabrous, the bracts 3, scalelike, triangular, (0.5) 1–4 mm long; peduncles absent or erect, 0.05–0.2 cm long, glabrous; involucres 1 per node, narrowly turbinate, 2–4 (4.5) mm long, 1–2 mm wide, glabrous, the teeth 5, erect, 0.3–0.7 mm long; flowers 2.5–4 mm long, the perianth white, glabrous, the hypanthium 1⁄4 length of perianth, essentially monomorphic, oblong to narrowly obovate, the stamens long-exserted, (2) 3–6 mm long, the filaments subglabrous or sparsely puberulent proximally; achenes brown, (2.5) 3.5–4 mm long, glabrous. 2n = 40.
The following pictures were taken north of Pinon, on Indian Road 41, (36°11’11” N / 110°14’5″ W ) with a population of very low plants – around 15/20 cm.
Flowering Jul-Nov. Clayey flats, slopes, and outcrops, mixed grassland and sagebrush communities, pinyon-juniper woodlands; 1500–2300 m; Garfield and San Juan cos., Utah, and adjacent Montezuma Co., Colorado, south into eastern Coconino, Navajo, and Apache cos., Arizona, and in Bernalillo, Cibola, McKinley, Rio Arriba, Sandoval, San Juan, Santa Fe, Taos and Valencia cos. of northwestern New Mexico.
The following pictures below were taken in Arizona, on Hopi and Navajo lands, on 87 north of Winslow (35°10’42” N / 110°26’35” W), with a population of very high plants.
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