San Francisco lessingia

Plants 5–30 cm. Stems erect, tan to reddish brown, glabrous or villous. Leaves: basal withering by flowering; cauline margins entire or dentate to pinnately lobed, faces eglandular, abaxial glabrous or villous. Heads usually borne singly, rarely in corymbiform arrays, at ends of branchlets. Involucres obconic to campanulate, 4–8 mm. Phyllaries purple-tipped, sometimes sparsely sessile-glandular, villous; inner scarious. Disc florets 20–40; corollas yellow (tubes with brown-purple band inside); style-branch appendages ± truncate-penicillate, 0.1–0.4 mm. Pappi tan, equaling or longer than cypselae. 2n = 10.

Flowering Jun–Nov. Remnant sand dunes in coastal scrub: of conservation concern; 20–100 m; Calif.

Lessingia germanorum is listed (federal and state) as endangered and is known only from the Presidio (San Francisco County) and near San Bruno Mountain (San Mateo County).