Taprooted perennial with milky sap. Stems erect, usually branched, 30–120 cm. Herbage glabrate to puberulent; stems hirsute below. Leaves basal and cauline; basal petiolate, oblanceolate, pinnately lobed, dentate, 8–20 cm long; cauline few, alternate, becoming auriculate-clasping. Heads ligulate, sessile in axils of reduced upper leaves. Involucres 9–15 mm high, glabrate to sparsely ciliate, cylindric; phyllaries imbricate in 2 series, lanceolate; receptacle flat, glabrous. Ray flowers perfect, 8 to 25, sky blue; ligules ca 15 mm long. Pappus of tiny scales. Achenes glabrous, 5-angled, 2–3 mm long (
Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).
POLLINATORS The following animal species have been reported as pollinators of this plant species or its genus where their geographic ranges overlap:
Bombus vagans,
Bombus bifarius,
Bombus fervidus, and
Bombus rufocinctus (Thorp et al. 1983, Colla and Dumesh 2010, Williams et al. 2014).