Herb, perennial, dioecious, caespitose with short ascending rhizomes, glabrous except for dense hairs in axils of the numerous cataphylls. Culms simple, strongly flattened, straight or flexuose, of 1 or 2 internodes, sometimes with 1 small persistent appressed sheath on the upper part of the culm. Male inflorescence terminal, of 1–3 shortly pedicellate, pendulous, many-flowered spikelets; glumes acuminate and scarious, without a mucro or awn. Female inflorescence of 1 terminal spikelet with 1–3 flowers and several sterile lower glumes. Flowers with (4) 5 (6) membranous tepals. Male flowers with 3 stamens, anthers exserted. Female flowers with 1-locular ovary; style 1. Fruit a nut, shed with persistent pedicel, perianth and asymmetric stylar beak. Seed smooth, with an irregular pattern of subangular isodiametric cells. Culm anatomy: chlorenchyma not interrupted, of 1 layer of elongated peg-cells, inward-projecting epidermal cells partially lining the substomatal cavities, epidermal cells with radial walls strongly thickened on the outer wall and outer part of radial walls, radially elongated epidermal cells forming mounds on the culm surface; with vascular bundles in central ground tissue and no central cavity. See also the detailed description Catacolea by Coleman in FloraBase (2016).
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