Western Goatsbeard

The leaves are both basal and stem, clasping and grass-like, but wide, with straight pointed tips, not twisting or recurving. Margins are smooth, the surfaces are like the stem - matted flattened hairs initially, then becoming smooth. Stem leaves are alternate. The first year plant produces a basal rosette.
The floral array is a single terminal flower head on a long stalk. The stalk enlarges (or inflates) below the flower head.
The flowers are about 1 1/2 inches wide and composed of 30 to 50+ pale yellow fertile ray florets, the outer ones much longer than the inner, and with 5 small teeth at the tip. Anthers of the five stamens are black and the style is bifurcated. The outer green phyllaries, which usually number between 8 and 12 and are usually in one series, are distinctively longer than the outer ray florets. They are very narrow and sharply pointed. Like T. pratensis, the Meadow Goatsbeard, the flower opens early and is frequently closed by early afternoon.
Seed: Fertile florets produce a long thin ribbed brown seed (a cypsela) with a whitish beak to which is attached a fluffy tannish-white pappus. This feathery down on each seed is interlaced forming a tall narrow cup-like structure. This structure is easily taken up by the wind.