A weak plant with slender wiry stems, woody, prostrate and rooting below, then ascending, 1/2 lin. or less thick, 4–6 in. long, with a few short weak ascending branches, sparsely hispidulous above, glabrate below. Leaves alternate, ovate, acute, base blunt, entire, margin above base crenate-serrate, 3/4 to barely 1 in. long, 1/2– 2/3 in. wide, 3-nerved, membranous, green on both faces but paler beneath, upper face scabrid with the dotted cystoliths and sparsely hispid, lower face hispid on the slender nerves; petiole very slender, half the length of the blade or less, hispidulous. Stipules ovate-acuminate, scarious, white with a green hispidulous midvein, about 1 lin. long. Inflorescence axillary, comprising a pair of androgynous involucres above each stipule and two younger female dichasia lateral at the base of the undeveloped axillary shoot; androgynous involucre becoming ventricose, with toothed margin, about 1 lin. long in fruit, puberulous on outside, containing 3 male and 2 female flowers. Female involucre, as in D. iners, 1-flowered. Male flower shortly stalked, mid-lobe of perianth shortly acute. Achene black, not shining, about 1/2 lin. long.
