Woody stock 6-7 cm in diam., densely beset with persistently lanate petiole remains. Petiole 1.5-7 cm, proximal half with dense long silky indumentum; leaf blade elliptic, oblong, or ovate, 3-15 × 1-4 cm, pinnatipartite to pinnately lobed, both surfaces sparsely to densely cobwebby or lanate; segments wide and short, with irregular shallow spine-tipped teeth; spines rigid, 2-4 mm. Flowering scapes solitary or few, decumbent or ascending, unbranched, leafless, 2-4 cm, densely whitish lanate. Bracts leathery, with shallow spiny lobes, abaxially cobwebby; outer bracts leaflike, not always present; inner bracts smaller, grading into phyllaries, with yellow spinules. Male capitula ca. 1 cm; female capitula ca. 2 cm. Involucre obconic to obovoid, ca. 1 cm in diam. Phyllaries few, imbricate, linear-lanceolate, abaxially subglabrous, margin entire and ciliate, apex spiny. Corolla whitish, 0.7-1.4 cm. Style distally thickened, in female florets smooth and with ± divergent triangular-ovate branches, in functionally male florets covered with sweeping hairs at tip; branches coherent, linear. Achene oblong, 8-10 mm, densely sericeous-villous. Pappus dirty white, inner pappus to 1.5 cm. Fl. and fr. May-Jun.

The roots are used medicinally.

Stony hillsides, sandy sloping fields, gravelly slopes; 800-1500 m. Nei Mongol [Mongolia].