Annuals. Flowering culms 30–50 cm high. Leaves: basal sheaths glabrous or pilose; blade to 4 mm wide, adaxially long-pilose, abaxially pilose or glabrous. Inflorescences: rachis glabrous; branches 1–2 cm long, far apart but appressed uniformly to axis or erect so that the rachis is scarcely visible. Spikelets appressed, overlapping, linear, with l:w greater than 4, (8–) 9–11 mm long, 1.2–1.5 (–2) mm wide, 7–9-flowered, with 3–4 closely imbricate (very frequently appressed) bisexual florets. Glumes: lower glume 2.5–3.5 mm long; upper glume 3–3.6 mm long. Basal lemma lanceolate, with back straight, 4.2–4.5 mm long, minutely lobed or emarginate, muticous to aristulate, decidedly firmer than the glumes, finely coriaceous, 3-nerved, smooth or scaberulous, glabrous; midnerve scabrous. Upper bisexual lemmas becoming narrower acropetally, awned. Palea 1/2–2/3 length of lemma body; body scaberulous, glabrous; keels rigidly ciliolate. Distal incomplete florets with narrower lemmas, with longer awns relative to lemma body.
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