Biennials or perennials, 30-100 cm, faintly aromatic (rhizomatous). Stems 1-3, erect, reddish brown, simple (leafy), glabrous or glabrate. Leaves basal (in rosettes, petiolate) and cauline, bicolor (white and green); blades ovate, 3-7(-20) × 2-4(-6) cm, 2-3-pinnately-lobed (lobes elliptic, 2-6 mm wide; cauline sessile, smaller), faces tomentose (abaxial) or glabrous or glabrescent (adaxial), glandular. Heads (nodding, peduncles 0 or 2) in paniculiform to racemiform arrays 10-35 × 2-4 cm (often 1-sided). Involucres broadly ovate, 3-5 × 4-5(-6) mm. Phyllaries broadly ovate, sparsely hairy. Florets: pistillate 4-5(-13), (1-1.5 mm); bisexual 25-35; corollas yellow, 1.5-2 mm, glabrous. Cypselae elliptic, 0.5-0.8 mm, glabrous.

Flowering late summer-early fall. Open coniferous forests, mid to upper montane; 2200-3100 m; Ariz., Colo., N.Mex.; Mexico (Chihuahua).