Plants herbs, spreading, compact, 0.7–1 (1.2) dm tall, (0.5) 0.4–1 dm across, tomentose and spreading villous; stems with caudex spreading, the aerial flowering stems erect or nearly so, slender, solid, not fistulose, arising directly from caudex branches, (0.5) 0.7–0.9 (1.1) dm long, tomentose and spreading villous, with a whorl of 3 foliaceous bracts mostly at midlength, 0.5–1 cm long, 0.4–0.7 cm wide; leaves basal, in loosely arranged rosettes, the petioles 0.4–0.8 cm long, tomentose and appressed to slightly villous, the blades ovate, 0.5–1.5 cm long, 0.5–1 cm wide, densely white tomentose and appressed to slightly spreading villous abaxially, greenish- white and slightly less densely tomentose adaxially, the margins entire, plane or slightly enrolled; inflorescences capitate, 1–2 cm wide, the branches absent, the bracts absent immediately below involucre; involucres 1 per node, campanulate, 4.5–7 mm long, 5–8 mm wide, tomentose and densely villous, the teeth 5–8, erect, 0.5–0.9 mm long; flowers 2.5–5 mm long, including a (0.1) 0.2–0.3 mm long stipelike base, the perianth bright yellow, glabrous, the tepals monomorphic, oblong-obovate, the stamens slightly exserted, 2.5–5 mm long, the filaments slightly pilose proximally; achenes light brown, 4–5 mm long, glabrous.

Flowering Jul-Sep. Crevices of rock faces and outcrops in (adjacent) conifer woodlands; 1045–1275 m.

All the pictures of Eriogonum villosissimum have been taken at Acker Rock, Douglas Co., Oregon.

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