rootstock woody, 1/2 in. or more thick, apparently extensively creeping underground, giving off erect or ascending shoots dividing at the surface of the ground into a compact cluster of branches 2–3 in. high, glabrous in all parts; branches leafless, succulent, 1–3 in. long, 3–3 1/2 lin. thick, usually bearing a compact irregular cluster of short branchlets at the apical part; when alive covered with alternate and more or less spirally arranged very obtusely rounded tubercles 1/2–1 lin. high, prominent and verruculose all over; when dried the tubercles almost disappear and the verruculose skin shrivels and has a whitish papillate papery appearance; leaves practically absent, reduced to very minute rudiments, alternate; male involucres in small sessile cymes or clusters at the tips of the branchlets, sessile, 1 lin. in diam. and about 3/4 lin. deep, cup-shaped, with 5 or occasionally 4 transversely oblong contiguous glands about 1/2 lin. in their greater diam., and with 2 or occasionally 3 broadly ovate fleshly keeled bracts at the base; female involucres and fruit not seen. null