Shrubs or treelets, 10-250 cm, spreading or broomlike. Flowering stems mostly glabrous. Leaf blades (flowering stems) scale-like, appressed, deltate, 2-3 mm. Peduncles 0-5+ mm. Involucres turbinate, 4-7 mm. Phyllaries 12-23, ovate to lanceolate, sparsely tomentose or glabrous. Florets 9-17; corollas 5-9 mm. Cypselae 3.5-5 mm, 10-15-nerved, glabrous; pappi 5-8 mm. 2n = 60, 90.

Flowering summer-fall. Sandy, gravelly soils, washes, terraces; 30-1600 m; Calif.; Mexico (Baja California).