Plants 8-25 cm. Basal leaves lanceolate to oblanceolate, 50-170 × 5-18 mm, faces silvery sericeous. Cauline leaves 7-30 mm, mostly not flagged (sometimes flagged near heads). Heads 3-15. Involucres: staminate 5.5-7 mm; pistillate 7-10 mm. Phyllaries distally light brown or castaneous. Corollas: staminate 3-4 mm; pistillate 3-4.3 mm. Cypselae 1.2-1.5 mm; pappi: staminate 4-6 mm; pistillate 5-7 mm. 2n = 56.

Flowering summer. Limestone barrens, serpentine; 0-300 m; Nfld. and Labr. (Nfld.), Que. (Anticosti Island).

Subspecies eucosma is known from limestone barrens in western Newfoundland and Anticosti Island (K. M. Urbanska 1983). It is morphologically similar to subsp. pulcherrima; the two are separated mainly by the presence of prominent flags on cauline leaves in subsp. pulcherrima and their absence in subsp. eucosma.