Absinthium lagocephalum Fischer ex Besser, Bull. Soc. Imp. Naturalistes Moscou 1: 233. 1829; Artemisia besseriana Ledebour; A. besseriana var. integrifolia Ledebour; A. besseriana var. triloba Ledebour; A. kruhsiana Besser; A. lagocephala var. besseriana (Ledebour) Pampanini; A. lagocephala f. integrifolia (Ledebour) Pampanini; A. lagocephala f. triloba (Ledebour) Pampanini; A. lagocephala var. triloba (Ledebour) Herder.

Subshrubs or herbs, caespitose, 40-80 cm tall, with woody rootstock, shortly branched, densely gray or brownish pubescent. Lowermost and middle stem leaves sessile, spatulate, elliptic-oblanceolate, or lanceolate, 3-6 × 0.3-1 cm, 3-5-crenately cleft or entire apically, cuneate basally, lacerate and serrate. Upper leaves and leaflike bracts lanceolate or linear-lanceolate, apex obtuse or acute. Synflorescence a racemelike panicle. Capitula pedunculate. Involucre hemispheric or subglobose, 4-6 mm in diam.; receptacle hemispheric, pubescent. Marginal female florets 7-10; corolla 3(or 4)-toothed. Disk florets 30-80, bisexual; corolla limb puberulent. Achenes ellipsoid or obovoid. Fl. and fr. Aug-Oct. 2n = 18.

Material of this species has sometimes been included within Artemisia chinensis (here treated as Crossostephium chinensis). Komarov (Fl. Manshur. 3: 668. 1907) placed material of this taxon within A. stelleriana Besser. Krasnoborov (Fl. Sibir. 13: 136-137. 1997) recognized A. kruhsiana as distinct:

Artemisia kruhsiana is distinguished by florets glabrous (vs. florets pubescent with slender crispate hairs in A. lagocephala); leaves white tomentose abaxially, fairly deeply once or twice trisect on vegetative shoots (vs. radical leaves gray tomentose abaxially, rather shallowly 3-lobate, with 3 teeth or entire in A. lagocephala); and plants to 40 cm tall (vs. plants 40-80 cm tall in A. lagocephala).

Hills, rocky slopes, ridges, outer forest margins, roadsides, forest steppes; below 2600 m. Heilongjiang, Jilin, E Nei Mongol, Sichuan [E Russia].