Annuals, biennials, or perennials, 20-40 cm; taprooted. Stems stipitate-glandular, sometimes lightly villous as well. Leaf blades mostly narrowly oblong-lanceolate, 4-10 cm × 5-10(-20) mm (relatively even-sized distally), bases auriculate-clasping to subclasping or not, decurrent (2-10 mm) or not, margins flat or slightly revolute, faces concolor, mostly green, stipitate-glandular, viscid, sometimes lightly villous as well. Heads in corymbiform arrays. Involucres campanulo-globose, 5.5-7 mm. Phyllaries in 7-10 series, white (opaque, shiny or dull), broadly ovate to oblong-obovate, glabrous. Pistillate florets 105-140. Bisexual florets 7-12. Cypselae ridged, smooth. 2n = 28.

Flowering Apr-Jul. Sandy canyons, dry hills, coastal chaparral; 60-800 m; Calif., Oreg.; Mexico (Baja California).

Leaf insertion in Pseudognaphalium californicum is unusually variable: bases may be clasping to subclasping without decurrent margins or decurrent and not show any clasping tendency.