Annual with fibrous, yellowish roots. Stems slender, tufted, often almost filiform, triquetrous, smooth, 1-20 cm by ½-1 mm. Leaves weak or somewhat rigid, canaliculate, gradually acuminate, scabrid in the upper part, 1-2 mm wide; lower sheaths stramineous to reddish brown. Inflorescence simple or subcompound. Involucral bracts 3-5, patulous, overtopping the inflorescence, the longest 2½-15(-20) cm. Primary rays 3-6, divergent, slender, smooth, up to 3 cm, but often very short and then inflorescence head-like. Spikes ovoid or subglobose, dense, with 5-30 spikelets 1-2 cm Ø; rachis short, up to 3 mm. Spikelets divergent, oblong to linear, subacute, strongly compressed, 8-30(-40)-flowered, 5-10(-13) by 1½-2½ mm (mucros included); rachilla straight, almost wingless, persistent; internodes ¼-⅓ mm. Glumes membranous, obliquely patent, sharply keeled, ovate, ½ imbricate, the body (1-)1¼-1¾ by 1-1¼ mm; apex truncate or retuse; keel 3-5-nerved, green or reddish brown; sides nerveless, silvery, stramineous, or spadiceous; mucro erect or slightly recurved, 1/5-⅓ mm. Stamen usually 1, but not rarely in some or all flowers stamens 2; anthers oblong, c. ⅓ mm. Stigmas 2. Nut biconvex, laterally compressed, oblong-obovate, obtuse to truncate at the apiculate apex, shining brown to castaneous, ½-¾ by ⅓-½ mm; epidermal cells isodiametric.
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Herbs, annual, cespitose. Culms trigonous, 1–35 cm × 0.5–1 mm, glabrous. Leaves flat, 5–20 cm × 1–2 mm. Inflorescences: heads ± digitate, 8–26 mm diam.; rays 1–6, 0.5–5 cm; bracts 3–4, ± horizontal, flat, 3–18 cm × 1–2 mm. Spikelets 6–25, ovoid to linear-lanceoloid, compressed, 4–15 × 1–2 mm; floral scales 8–28(–40), clear, laterally ribless, ovate, 1.4–1.6 × 0.8 mm, apex awned, awn excurved, 0.3–0.5 mm. Flowers: stamens 1–2; anthers 0.2 mm; styles 0.5 mm; stigmas 0.3 mm. Achenes dark brown to black, sessile, obovoid, 0.6 × 0.4 mm, apex obtuse, apiculate, surfaces minutely punctate.
In open, damp to rather dry localities: fields, moist meadows, humid flats, etc. often on sandy soil, 0-600 m.
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