Perennial. Culms compactly tufted, wiry, erect or geniculate, 15–45 cm tall, pubescent especially below nodes. Basal leaf sheaths tough, lacking cleistogamous spikelets, not becoming fibrous; leaf blades usually involute, rarely flat, often diverging at a wide angle from the culm, 3–17 cm, 3–4 mm wide, pubescent, acuminate. Panicle olive-gray or tinged purplish, contracted to spikelike, narrowly oblong, 4–18 × 1–2 cm. Spikelets with 3 or 4 florets, 8–14 mm; glumes puberulous, (5–) 7–9-veined, lower glume 5–10 mm, upper glume 7–11 mm; lowest lemma 2–3.2 mm, shortly villous; awns 4.5–7 mm, unequal with 4 shorter, ciliate in lower 2/3–3/4 of their length; third lemma sterile but well developed, 3–5 mm (including awns); fourth lemma vestigial or absent. Anthers 0.5–1.3 mm. Fl. May. 2n = 20.
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