It is native to the western United States around the intersection of Nevada, Arizona, and California, where it grows in desert and other habitat with sandy soils.

This is an annual herb producing gray-green woolly stems in a low clump just a few centimeters high to a relatively erect 40 centimeters tall.

The flower heads appear singly or in open arrays.

Each head has a bell- to bullet-shaped involucre lined with hairy to woolly phyllaries.

The fruit is an achene with a whitish or brownish pappus of bristles.