Herb, dioecious, caespitose, perennial, forming small, dense, many-culmed tussocks; cluster and sand-binding roots present. Cataphylls short, 3–8 mm long. Culms repeatedly branched, erect, terete to semi-terete, glabrous or pilose with long hairs, often longitudinally furrowed, smooth or finely striate or minutely tuberculate, to 50 cm high, 0.5–1.2 mm diam., internodes numerous; culm branches of male plants commonly sinuous-erect, females more flexuose and tangled. Sheaths appressed, green to dark red-brown, glabrous or villous, 4–7.5 mm long, truncate, apex fringed by long (1–3 mm) spreading white hairs; lamina 2–3 (–5.5) mm long. Male spikelets borne singly or less often in pairs, sessile, axillary at 5–10 successive upper nodes, narrow-elliptic, 3.0–6.5 mm long; 3–7-flowered, glumes 3–8, ovate to lanceolate, acute, 1.6–3.7 mm long, yellow to light brown, glabrous or apically villous, mucro 0.3–1.0 mm long. Female spikelets borne singly at upper nodes, ellipsoid, 4.5–6.0 mm long; 1 (–3)-flowered, glumes 3–5, ovate, acuminate, 2.3–6.0 mm long, green to pale yellow, usually villous towards apex, mucro 0.4–2.0 mm long. Male flowers: tepals 5, scarious, narrow-lanceolate to linear, acute, equal in length or inner tepals occasionally shorter, 1.5–3.3 mm long; anthers 1.0–1.3 mm long. Female flowers lacking tepals; ovary unilocular, style 1, mostly stigmatic. Nut narrow-ellipsoid, 1.5–2 mm long, dark brown with pale lateral lines, stipe c. 1 mm long, the style base persistent as a small rounded cap on the fruit. Culm anatomy: chlorenchyma continuous.
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