Herbs, perennial. Rhizome up to 1 cm in diam., woody, fibrous-splintery, multicipital. Flowering stems few to numerous, 30-60 cm tall, branching approximately from middle (rarely simple), with slender ramuscules 5-12 cm; entire plant covered, with thin dense whitish-grayish tomentose pubescence. Leaves of sterile offshoots linear-spatulate, wider and longer than linear-lanceolate acuminate leaves of flowering stems. Capitula 3-6 or more arranged at ends of shoots and branches, narrowly campanulate or obconical, 5-7 × 4-6 mm, almost as long as peduncles, or subsessile. Phyllaries ca. 30, yellow, rather loosely imbricate, arranged in 6 or 7 rows, ± squarrose in upper part, abaxially tomentose pubescent in lower part, outermost ones lanceolate and 1/3-1/2 as long as inner ones, linear-lanceolate or spatulate, acuminate or truncate at apex. Florets in a capitulum ca. 25. Pappus of ca. 40 very thin hairs. Fl. Jul-Sep. 2n = 28.

Gravelly places, dry slopes, dunes; below 3000 m. W Xinjiang [Kazakhstan].