Plants 20-80(-150) cm. Stems usually branched from mid heights or distally. Leaves 4-10 pairs, mostly cauline (evenly distributed; basal leaves often withered by flowering, 1-2 pairs, subsessile to short-petiolate); sessile (proximalmost with membranous connate-sheathing bases); blades lance-elliptic, broadly oblanceolate, or oblong, 5-20 × 2-6(-8) cm, margins entire or remotely denticulate to prominently dentate, apices acute, faces nearly glabrous or puberulent to sparsely or densely white-tomentose-pilose. Heads (1-)3-10(-16). Involucres campanulate (rarely hemispheric). Phyllaries 8-23, nearly linear to narrowly lanceolate (apices each with conspicuous tuft of white hairs). Ray florets 8-20; corollas yellow. Disc florets: corollas yellow; anthers yellow. Cypselae gray to brown, 3-8 mm, subglabrous to sparsely hirsutulous, stipitate-glandular; pappi stramineous, bristles barbellate to subplumose. 2n = 38, 57, 76. Flowering Apr-Sep. Moist meadows and conifer forests, stream banks, late snow-melt areas, often montane to subalpine; 0-3500 m; Alta., B.C., Man., N.W.T., Ont., Que., Sask., Yukon; Alaska, Ariz., Calif., Colo., Idaho, Mont., Nev., N.Mex., Oreg., Utah, Wash., Wyo.

Plant: perennial, 3-8 dm, ± hairy, generally glandular upward, from long, naked rhizome; stem 1, branched above Leaves: basal 0 or generally withered by flower; cauline opposite, 5-10 pairs, sessile or short-petioled, 5-20(30) cm, blade (ob)lanceolate, (sub)entire, upper ± reduced INFLORESCENCE: primary inflorescence a head, each resembling a flower; heads radiate, 5-10; involucre 8-15 mm, bell-shaped; phyllaries ± obtuse, inner face generally hair-tufted near tip Flowers: Ray flowers generally 13; ligules 1-2 cm, (orange-)yellow; Disk flowers many; corolla generally soft-hairy, colored like ligules; anther bases entire or slightly sagittate, tips triangular; style branches flat, tips truncate, very short, hair-tufted Fruit: achene, 4-5 mm, ± glabrous to short-hairy, glandular, cylindric, 5-10-veined; pappus short-barbed or weakly subplumose, dirty white to straw-colored Misc: Damp meadows, rocky places, coniferous forest; 1800-3500 m.; Jul-Aug