Plant about 2 feet tall. Leaves opposite each other, sometimes alternate near the top of the stem. Leaves long and narrow, usually with oner or two long narrow lobes at the base. Flowerheads a little over an inch across, single on long stalks. An orange-yellow set of disc flowers in the center is surrounded by a whorl of yellow rays that end in 3 to 7 irregular lobes. blooms in the late spring.

A great plains species, that may have been native to parts of Virginia. However, it is frequently cultivated and so probably escaped in our state. First spotted in 2014 on the low cliffs on the east side of Wildwood Drive.

The full heads of multilobed rays are distinctive in the Park, as are the narrow leaves with a variable number of lobes. Greater coreopsis (Coreopsis major) has heads less full and leaves appearing to form a neat whorl of siz (but actually a pair with 3 lobes each).