General:
Perennial herb from a branching, thickened stem-base; stems erect, several, simple, finely hairy with short, appressed or loose hairs, 1.5-15 cm tall.

Leaves:
Basal leaves abruptly contracted to stalked, with broad, elliptic to egg-shaped or almost round blades, entire, 0.5-8 cm long, 4-13 mm wide, hairy like the stems; stem leaves few, reduced and narrow.

Flowers:
Heads with ray and disk flowers, solitary, the disks 7-16 mm wide; involucres 5-8 mm tall; involucral bracts loose, equal, leafy and sometimes tinged with red, sparsely to densely long woolly-hairy, the hairs sometimes with purple cross-walls; ray flowers mostly 25-70, yellow, 6-9 mm long, 1.4-2.5 mm wide; disk flowers 3.5-5.0 mm long.

Fruits:
Achenes hairy, 2-nerved; pappus double, inner of 10-25 bristles, outer of short bristles or narrow scales.

Notes:
Tonestus (Haplopappus) lyallii, a somewhat similar alpine species, is easily distinguished from Erigeron aureus by its abundance of glands.

Source:  The Illustrated Flora of British Columbia

If more than one illustration is available for a species (e.g., separate illustrations were provided for two subspecies) then links to the separate images will be provided below. Note that individual subspecies or varietal illustrations are not always available.

Illustration Source:  The Illustrated Flora of British Columbia