Herb, dioecious, caespitose, perennial, forming dense tussocks with spreading culms, the base with woolly pubescence partly covered by thin, pale to light orange-brown, overlapping scales. Culms erect, 1–2 mm diam. towards the base; narrower, flexuose and much-branched above; 15–70 (–100) cm long, terete to subterete or compressed, striate, young culms densely pubescent or tomentose. Sheaths 1–2 cm long on the larger culms, decreasing to c. 0.3 cm long on the branches, acute to obtuse; green to brown or straw-coloured, glabrous to densely pubescent; lamina erect or reflexed, flattened or terete, straight or curved, to 2 (–2.5) cm long. Inflorescence: male spikelets sessile on branched lateral branches at most culm nodes; female spikelets solitary, sessile, on lateral branches. Male spikelets ovoid to ellipsoid, 2.2–4.5 mm long, with 3–9 sterile lower glumes and 5–25 fertile upper glumes; glumes ovate, aristate, light to dark brown, glabrous to sparsely pubescent, 1.3–1.7 mm long with a mucro c. 0.1–0.4 mm long. Female spikelets narrow-ovoid, 6–8.6 mm long; glumes 5–10, broad-lanceolate, acuminate, usually the abaxial surface and apical margin pubescent; glumes green to straw-coloured or brown; lower glumes 1.5–3.3 mm long, mucro 0.7–4.0 mm long; upper glumes 4–7.5 mm long. Male flowers: tepals 5, lanceolate to oblanceolate, acute to acuminate; outer tepals slightly longer than inner, 1.1–1.5 mm long; inner tepals flat; staminal filaments 1.3–2.0 mm long, anthers 0.6–0.8 mm long, exserted. Female flowers: flower stalk with 1 or 2 minute bracts; tepals 0.5–1.1 mm long; style 3-branched. Fruit a nut with woody pericarp, globoid, 2.0–3.4 mm long, 1.5–1.8 mm wide, pitted, yellow to dark brown, glossy when fresh, shed with short stalk and perianth. Seed ovoid, light orange-brown, 1.7–1.9 mm long, 0.95–1.2 mm wide. Culm anatomy: chlorenchyma of 2–4 layers of short cells, interrupted by pillar cells and partial sclerenchyma ridges opposite the outer vascular bundles.
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