Stems wiry, densely to sparsely clad in long silky hairs, rooting at nodes; branches ∞, short, ascending, concealed by densely imbricate ± glab. lvs with sheaths closely appressed. Lamina c. 3-5 mm. long, cut straight down to truncate or rounded sheath into 5-7 linear-subulate erect teeth. Sheath chartaceous, 2-2.5 × 2-2·25 mm. Scape 3-5 mm. long, terminal, clad in ascending slender hairs, nude. Capitula terminal, 3-4 mm. long; receptacle hemispherical. Phyll. in 1-2 series, ovate-oblong, obtuse; margins purple, scarious, ± ciliolate; ± 2 mm. long, midvein purplish. ♀ "few, in 1 series; corolla ovoid, compressed, narrowed at the mouth. Disc-florets numerous, funnel-shaped". Achenes compressed-obovoid, glab., weakly ribbed.

2n = 52

2n = 52

A woody perennial herb forming tight mats 1-3 cm thick, in patches up to ca. 1 m wide. Rhizomes packed together, ± horizontal and ascending at tips, obscured by crowded leaves; branches single or 2-3 clustered and diverging, at intervals of 0.5-3.0 cm; living leaves closely imbricate on apical ca. 0.5 cm of each stem; lower parts of stems covered with persistent dead leaves. No short shoots. Roots issuing from lower parts of stems, slender but becoming subwoody, up to 0.5 mm diam. Leaves sessile, palmately divided, curved around stem, 4-6 × 4-5mm; blade ca. 3 mm long, crescent shaped, coriaceous, dark green, with scattered short hairs; lobes us. 7, linear, subterete, in a half-circle with central lobes above shorter lateral lobes, acute to acuminate, cut to top of broad leaf base. Peduncles less or greater than leaves, up to 0.7 cm long, nude or with 1 small bract, pilose. Subdioecious? Heads not or scarcely emergent from mat surface, small, 2-4 mm diam.; surface convex; involucre hemispherical; phyllaries in 2 subequal rows, elliptic or oblong, thin, dark-green with wide, pale ± keeled midrib, glabrous, with wide brown scarious margin, not growing after anthesis. Pistillate plants (?) with heads with 10-15 phyllaries and 20-45 pistillate florets; florets ca. 2.25 mm long, straight, yellow-red, corolla twice as long as wide, with equal teeth. Staminate plants (?) with heads with 8-12 phyllaries, 0 or 1-8 pistillate florets and 10-35 staminate florets. Achenes up to 1.3 × 0.65 mm, ± compressed, biconvex, golden-brown shiny, scarcely wrinkled. Flowers in summer.