White-cloaked cudweed

Annuals (winter annuals), 1–45 cm; fibrous-rooted. Stems erect to decumbent-ascending, not pan-nose (indument whitish, like closely appressed, polished cloth, hairs usually not individually evident). Leaves basal and cauline, basal present through flowering, blades oblanceolate to oblanceolate-spatulate, 2–6(–7) cm × 5–13 mm (gradually smaller, becoming linear bracts distally), faces bicolor, abaxial closely white-pannose, adaxial sparsely arachnose (light green, hairs persistent, closely appressed, nearly microscopic). Heads initially in ± continuous, cylindric arrays 3–5(–7) cm × 10–12 mm (pressed), later sometimes interrupted and 7–20 cm (producing axillary glomerules from proximal nodes). Involucres cylindro-campanulate, 3.5–4 mm, bases sparsely arachnose. Phyllaries in 4–5 series, outer ovate, lengths ¹/3 inner, apices acute to acute-acuminate, inner oblong-lanceolate, laminae (± striate) purplish (at stereome and on distal margins or not at all), apices acute to acute-acuminate (not apiculate, slightly flaring outward in fruit). Florets: bisexual 2–4; all corollas brownish yellow to purple distally (sometimes purple only on adaxial faces of lobes in bisexual corollas). Cypselae (purple) 0.5–0.6 mm.

Flowering (Mar–)Apr–May(–Jun). Disturbed, open sites, roadsides, banks, woods edges and clearings, fields, flood plains, pastures, sandy, loamy, and clay soils; 0–200 m; Ala., Ark., Fla., Ga., La., Miss., N.C.