Rhizome thick and short, woody. Culms lateral, 30-90 cm tall, trigonous, stiff, smooth. Sterile leaves longer than culm, blades broadly linear, 1-2.2 cm wide, flat, leathery, base plicate, upper margins scabrous, apex acuminate. Involucral bracts leaflike, longer than inflorescence, sheathing. Spikes 3 or 4, distant; terminal spike male, linear-cylindric, 4.5-8 cm, pedunculate; lateral spikes mostly female, with several male flowers at apex, uppermost spike contiguous with male spike, remaining spikes distant, cylindric, 4.5-9 × 0.9-1.3 cm, densely flowered, with short peduncles. Female glumes pale green, ovate-oblong or oblong, 3-3.5 mm, green 3-veined costa excurrent into a scabrous awn. Utricles yellow-green or green, much longer than glume, obliquely patent, elliptic-rhomboid, 9-10 mm (including beak), papery, glabrous, many veined, base gradually narrowed, apex abruptly contracted into a long beak, orifice 2-toothed. Nutlets yellow-brown, tightly enveloped, rhomboid-elliptic, trigonous, ca. 7 mm, constricted on angles at middle, faces concave at base, base curved stipitate, apex abruptly contracted into a slender and erect beak, orifice annulate; style base broadly conic; stigmas 3. Fl. and fr. Apr-Jul.
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