Forms rounded mounds; stems smooth, fork repeatedly, not hairy, spread horizontally then become upright; spicy- or lemon-scented; leafy plant with small yellow flower heads having ray and disc flowers, clustered at branch ends.
Often forms round bushes, spicy-scented; leaves narrow, margins with 1 to 3 bristles, dotted by glands; flower heads in congested rounded clusters, bracts narrow dotted by glands; ray flowers mostly 8, disc flowers 6 to 34; achenes have feathery bristles.
Habitat
Lower and upper dry desert, pinyon-juniper, chaparral, open sunny areas, rocky hillsides, mesas, sandy and gravelly areas and common along roadsides.
Flower Characteristics
Flowers bright yellow in small clusters of 2 to 4+ flower heads on leafy branch tips; phyllaries (bracts) 7 to 9, narrow, have conspicuous glands below their tips; 6 to 34 disc flowers, can be glandular and hairy; 8 ray flowers, 1/4 inch long.
Leaf and Stem Characteristics
Leaves narrow to thread-like, curved; dotted with conspicuous oval glands along the margins, mostly smooth (without hairs); 2 to 5 pairs of bristles near base.
Fruit and Seed Characteristics
Sparse stiff hairs, disc achenes topped by 12 to 20 sparsely short-feathery or slightly barbed bristles, ray achenes rarely have bristles.