Plants rhizomatous or with woody caudices. Herbage glabrous or ± arachnose. Stems 1 (plants rhizomatous) or 2-3+ (plants with woody caudices), erect, freely branched, herbaceous, relatively leafy distally. Cauline leaves: proximal not pinnately lobed (lanceolate to lance-linear, margins entire or denticulate, apices acute to acuminate); distal lanceolate or elliptic to linear, margins entire or denticulate, apices acute to acuminate. Arrays of heads relatively crowded. Cypselae 2-2.5 mm. 2n = 18.

Flowering Mar-Dec. Crumbling shale along roadcuts, in canyons, chaparral, foothill woodlands; 200-1600 m; Calif.

Variety commutata grows on the eastern face of the Transverse Range (Ventura County), in canyons in the Coast Ranges to Monterey County, and in the Breckenridge Mountains (Kern County).