Stems 3-12 cm. Leaves: blades linear to narrowly spatulate, (4-)9-17(-21) × 0.7-1.5(-2) mm, margins ciliate, often stipitate-glandular, midnerves raised and secondary nerves usually evident abaxially, apices acute, ± minutely mucronate, faces scabrous and sparsely villous, densely stipitate-glandular. Peduncles villous, stipitate-glandular. Involucres 6-8 × 6-12 mm. Phyllaries mostly green except for translu-cent margins, oblong to narrowly oblanceolate, 4.6-8× 0.8-2.3 mm, evidently 1-nerved (apices acute to attenuate), stipitate-glandular. Ray florets 5-8; laminae 4.5-12 × 1.3-5.5 mm, tubes hairy. Disc florets 9-27; corollas 4.5-7.6, lobes 0.8-2 mm; style branches 1.2-2.3 mm, appendages 0.6-1.3 mm. Cypselae 3.5-5 mm, hairy; pappi of ± 30 bristles. 2n = 18 (as Haplopappus stenophyllus).

Flowering mid-late spring. Sagebrush steppe on basaltic, rhyolitic, or granitic soils; 900-2300 m; Calif., Idaho, Nev., Oreg., Wash.