Plants perennial, 7--18(--25) cm tall. Rhizome creeping, thick. Stems arising singly, terete, ca. 1 mm in diam. Cataphylls several, brown, shiny, apex sometimes sharply pointed. Basal cauline leaves 2(or 3), terete, 5.5--15 cm × 0.6--1 mm; distal cauline leaves usually 2, terete, 1--3 cm; leaf sheath auricles well developed, obtuse, free part ca. 1.5 × 1 mm; leaf blade brownish. Inflorescences terminal; head solitary, 0.4--1.8 cm in diam., (2--)4--10-flowered; bracts 3--5, lanceolate, shorter than or subequaling flowers; basal bract sometimes slightly longer than flowers, 3.3--6 × ca. 3 mm, apex acuminate. Perianth segments dark purple, yellowish, or whitish, lanceolate, 4.5--5 × ca. 1.2 mm, subequal, veins 3, apex obtuse to acute. Stamens 6; filaments black-brown at maturity, 3--5 mm; anthers 1.8--3 mm. Ovary 1-loculed, imperfectly 3-septate. Style 1.8--2 mm; stigmas 0.8--1 mm. Capsule dark chestnut brown, trigonous ovoid, ca. 3 mm, apex beaked; beak ca. 0.8 mm. Seeds obliquely ovoid, ca. 0.7 mm, both ends appendaged; appendages white, 0.1--0.2 mm. Fl. Jun--Jul, fr. Jul--Aug.

Abies forests, grasslands in high mountains, wet places; 3000--4200 m. Gansu, Qinghai, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Xizang, Yunnan [Bhutan, India, Nepal, Sikkim].