Perennial herb with a single or several unbranched flowering stem(s) to 40 cm high, these glabrous or pilose near the capitulum; taproot simple or branched. Leaves in rosette, oblanceolate in outline, 5–40 cm long, 1.5–5.5 cm wide, base long-attenuate but amplexicaul at the very base, margins pinnatilobed to pinnatisect, the 2–6 lobes triangular, often dentate and often reflexed, apex acute, glabrous or sparsely pilose. Capitulum erect; involucre 11–25 mm long; phyllaries 6–20 mm long, acute, glabrous, with narrow scarious margins, unequal, the outermost smallest and often reflexed. Corolla yellow, the outermost ligules often brownish beneath, tube cylindric, 2.8–3.7 mm long, ligules 7–12 mm long, 2–2.5 mm wide, the innermost smaller than the outer. Achenes fusiform, the body 2.5–4 mm long, attenuate into a long narrow beak 4–15 mm long, the body ribbed, with antrorse spinules; pappus of barbellate setae 4–7 mm long. Fig. 19.
