Herb, dioecious, perennial, rhizomatous, often forming dense patches. Cluster roots present. Rhizome horizontal, 4–10 mm diam.; scales pale-brown. Cataphylls 0.3–1 cm long. Culms terete, unbranched, usually striate, 50–100 cm long, 1.3–4.0 mm diam.; internodes 12–15, up to 9 cm long. Sheaths closely appressed, scarious, glabrous, smooth or ribbed, 1–3 cm long; apex acute or obtuse, lamina usually absent, but when present narrow, terete, ± erect, up to 1 cm long; margin narrowly membranous becoming dark with age. Inflorescence narrow, to 25 cm long with 5–70 shortly pedicellate or nearly sessile spikelets; subtending bracts erect or occasionally reflexed by contact with the lower spikelets, closely appressed, shorter than the lowest spikelets, 0.5–1.2 cm long, the apical free portion rounded or abruptly tapered with a tuft of long white hairs. Male spikelets globose to ovoid, 6–7 mm long; lower 2–6 glumes sterile, upper c. 20–45 glumes fertile, ovate, caudate, 2.3–3.0 mm long, glabrous or with long marginal hairs, red-brown; awn 0.7–1.0 mm long. Female spikelets ovoid, 5–10 mm long; lower 3–5 glumes sterile; upper c. 25–40 glumes fertile, broad-ovate, caudate, 2.0–2.5 mm long, glabrous or with long marginal hairs, golden-brown; awn 0.6–1.1 mm long. Male flowers: tepals 6, lanceolate, acuminate, glabrous, inner and outer equal, c. 2 mm long; filaments 1.5–2.9 mm long; anthers exserted, 1.2–1.4 mm long. Female flowers: tepals 4, glabrous; outer tepals slightly longer than inner, 2.0–2.2 mm long; styles 2, very shortly united at base, recurved. Capsule globose, c. 1 mm long. Seeds ellipsoid, pale-brown, smooth, c. 0.6 mm long. Culm anatomy: epidermis with stomates not sunken, chlorenchyma of elongated peg cells, sometimes interrupted by parenchyma ‘rays’, not interrupted by thick-walled cells, parenchyma sheath mostly one cell thick, central cavity present.
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