Perennials, 40-100 cm.
Leaves mostly alternate (at least not regularly opposite, crowded, with axillary clusters of smaller leaves); petioles 0; blades (3-nerved) narrowly lanceolate to lance-linear, 1.5-4 cm, margins serrulate.
Heads borne in ± congested, compact clusters.
Peduncles 0 or 1-4 mm, sessile-glandular, villous-puberulent.
Involucres 5-6(-7) mm.
Phyllaries sessile-glandular, sparsely villosulous, apices acute to acuminate.
Corollas white or pink, lobes sparsely sessile-glandular, finely villous-hirsute.
Pappi usually ± equaling corollas, sometimes coroniform or 0.
2n = (22-)34(-54) univalents, less often 17 pairs. Flowering (Jul-)Aug-Oct. Roadsides, disturbed sites, oak-grasslands, oak-pine grasslands, and oak, mixed conifer-oak, mixed pine, ponderosa pine-Douglas fir, pine-fir-aspen, spruce-Douglas fir, and fir-hemlock woodlands; 1700-2700 m; Ariz., N.Mex., Tex.; Mexico. Some collections of
Stevia serrata from Cochise and Graham counties, Arizona, were annotated by J. L. Grashoff as '
S. serrata >
plummerae'; in leaf arrange-ment and morphology (venation, margin, and shape), they appear to be similar to typical
S. serrata from the same area.