Perennials; glabrous throughout. Stems erect or ascending, unbranched or branched distally, 3-12 dm. Basal leaves not rosulate; petiole 1-8 cm; blade broadly obovate or oblong to elliptic, 2-10 cm × 20-120 mm, margins usually entire, rarely coarsely dentate-sinuate. Cauline leaves (distalmost) shortly petiolate; blade lanceolate to linear, 1-3.5 cm × 3-10 mm, margins entire. Racemes (densely flowered), without a terminal cluster of sterile flowers. Fruiting pedicels ascending, 5-35 mm. Flowers: sepals erect, (purplish or green to yellowish green), lanceolate, 7-12 × 2-3 mm (equal); petals purple or yellowish green, (not or faintly veined),11-17.5 mm, blade 3-6 × 1.8-2.7 mm, not crisped, claw narrowly oblong to narrowly oblanceolate, 8-12 × 3-4 mm; filaments tetradynamous, median pairs 3.5-8 mm, lateral pair 2-7 mm; anthers narrowly oblong, equal, 3.5-4.5 mm. Fruits divaricate to ascending (often distinctly curved), terete, 4.5-15.5 cm × 1-1.6 mm; valves obscurely veined; ovules 180-210 per ovary; style 0.2-1 mm; stigma strongly 2-lobed (lobes 0.9-1.5 mm, connivent, opposite replum). Seeds 1-2 × 0.8-1.2 mm. 2n = 20.

Flowering Apr-Jun. Sagebrush scrub, dry slopes and rocky outcrops; of conservation concern; 1500-2400 m; Calif., Nev.

Caulanthus glaucus is known in California from Inyo and Mono counties and in Nevada from Esmeralda, Mineral, and Nye counties.