云南小苦荬 yun nan xiao ku mai

Herbs 8-15 cm tall, perennial, rosulate. Stems solitary or few, ascending-erect to erect, branched already from base, glabrous. Rosette leaves elliptic, lanceolate, or oblanceolate, 2-4 × 0.2-0.5 cm, base attenuate into an unwinged petiole-like portion, margin entire or weakly sinuate-dentate, apex acute to rounded and mucronulate. Stem leaves few, concentrated in basal portion, similar to rosette leaves but smaller. Synflorescence laxly corymbose, with few to several capitula. Capitula with 5-8 florets; peduncle capillaceous, 3-10 mm. Involucre narrowly cylindric, 5-6 mm. Phyllaries abaxially glabrous; outer phyllaries ca. 3, ovate, longest ca. 1 mm, apex acute; inner phyllaries 5, apex acute. Florets yellow. Achene yellowish brown, subfusiform, ca. 4 mm, apex attenuate into a slender 0.5-1 mm beak. Pappus straw-colored, ca. 4 mm. Fl. and fr. Jun.

● Grasslands on mountain slopes; 1700-3600 m. Yunnan.

The pappus color in the original description of Ixeridium yunnanense is erroneously given as white.