Herbs or subshrubs, perennial, 0.3-2 m, glabrous; rootstock elongate, woody. Stems erect or clambering, branched from rootstock. Leaves: petiole 0.5-2 cm; blade unlobed, deltate, ovate, rhombic, to triangular-lanceolate, 3-7 × 1-4 cm, base abruptly narrowed, truncate, or oblique, apex acute to acuminate. Inflorescences lax panicles of few terminal or axillary spikes, units less than 10 mm diam. Flowers: tepals greenish, greenish white, or pinkish green, striate, drying to tan, ± equal, 3.5-7 mm, rather rigid; style 1 mm; stigmas 3. Utricles 4-5 mm. Seeds to 20, 0.8-1 mm diam., faintly reticulate or smooth.

Flowering fall-winter. Coastal sand dunes, coppices, kitchen middens, hammocks, thickets, oak savannas, gravel slopes; 0-800 m; Fla., Tex.; Mexico; West Indies; South America.

Celosia nitida is widespread in subtropical regions of the New World. In Florida, it occurs mostly in the Keys north to Dade, Lake, Lee, and Monroe counties; in Texas it is known from the south Texas plains, gulf prairies and marshes, and barely into the Edwards Plateau.