Annuals or, sometimes, bi-ennials; with a fine taproot; sparsely pubescent, trichomes (sessile), 3-6-rayed, rays furcate, (tuberculate throughout). Stems several from base, erect or decumbent and straggling, (branched distally, branches usually filiform), to 5 dm. Basal leaves: blade obovate or rhombic to broadly elliptic, 1-4.5(-6.5) cm, margins entire or lyrate-pinnatifid. Cauline leaves: (proximal petiolate, distal sessile); blade rhombic or obovate to elliptic, 0.5-2 (-3) cm, margins entire or sinuate to remotely toothed. Racemes loose. Fruiting pedicels (recurved in age), 5-10(-15) mm, (slender). Flowers: sepals elliptic or ovate, 2.5-5.5 mm, (median pair thickened apically, cucullate); petals (yellow to orange-yellow), obovate to cuneate, 4-7 mm, (apex sometimes retuse). Fruits globose or subglobose, not or slightly inflated, (2-) 3-5(-7) mm; valves (not retaining seeds after dehiscence), glabrous throughout; replum as wide as or wider than fruit; ovules (4-)8-16(-20) per ovary; style (1-5-)2-4.5 mm. Seeds flattened. 2n = 10.

Flowering Mar-Apr. Light dry soils, limestone chip, open rocky areas, among boulders, roadsides, pastures, stony open sandy prairies, dry streamside meadows, calcareous soils, limestone outcroppings, scrub-oak grassland flats; 150-700 m; Tex.

Physaria recurvata is known from the Edwards Plateau.