Usually dense, light or greyish green, or glaucous, annual tufts; branching intravaginal. Leaf-sheath finely striate. Ligule oblong, tapered, subobtuse or denticulate, or later lacerate. Leaf-blade firm, abaxially smooth or minutely papillose, sometimes scabrid above, adaxially minutely scabrid on ribs; margins minutely scabrid, tip acute to subobtuse. Culm included within leaf-sheaths, internodes very finely scabrid below panicle, rarely visible until culm breaks up at maturity. Panicle delicate, ± contracted, later spreading, enclosed at base by sheath of uppermost culm-leaf; branches and branchlets ± erect, all ± equal in length, scabrid, naked for much of their length, the ultimate branchlets tipped by 1-2 spikelets. Spikelets light green or greenish brown. Glumes smooth, keel scabrid, margins hyaline, finely scabrid above. Lemma to ¾ length of glumes, 5-nerved, with scattered to rather dense short silky hairs, often glabrous above, lateral nerves shortly excurrent, faintly scabrid; awn ± middorsal. Palea slightly < lemma, keels minutely excurrent, faintly scabrid at tip. Callus hairs dense, very short, to ⅕ length of lemma. Rachilla prolongation almost 0, or very short and tipped by a longer hair tuft. Lodicules linear, acute.
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