Plants 10-40 cm. Stems spreading to erect (bushes mostly broader than high), highly branched, green when young, becoming reddish brown, long-stipitate-glandular. Leaves ascending; blades oblanceolate, 5-40 × 2-7 mm, midnerves evident, (margins crispate) apices acute, faces long - stipitate-glandular; fascicles absent or of 1-3 leaves. Heads borne singly or (2-3) in (leafy) racemiform arrays (1-4 cm wide). Peduncles 2-20(-40) mm (bracts 1-10+, leaflike). Involucres campanulate, 9-15 × 10-15 mm. Phyllaries 17-31 in 2-3 series, green to tan, lanceolate to obovate, 8-18 × 1-4 mm, subequal, outer herbaceous or herbaceous-tipped, inner chartaceous to herbaceous-tipped, midnerves (+ 2 smaller, collateral nerves) often evident, (margins herbaceous or narrowly membranous, mostly stipitate glandular to fimbriate) apices acute to acuminate, abaxial faces stipitate-glandular. Ray florets (0-)1-8; laminae elliptic, 8-14 × 1.5-4 mm. Disc florets 15-40; corollas 8.5-10.5 mm. Cypselae narrowly turbinate to ellipsoid, 5.5-8 mm, villous; pappi tan, 7.5-9 mm. 2n = 18.

Flowering mid summer-fall. Rocky slopes and ridges in conifer forests and alpine zones; 2100-3500 m; Calif., Idaho, Mont., Nev., Oreg., Wyo.