Perennial, rhizomatous, basal sheaths papery, in tight bunches, eventually becoming fibrous. Culms solitary or tufted, 25–70 cm tall, ca. 2 cm in diam. Leaf sheaths glabrous, scaberulous toward ligule; leaf blades convolute, gray-green, 9–20 cm × 0.8–3 mm, abaxial surface smooth, adaxial surface scabrid, apex acute; ligule 1–2.5 mm. Panicle 5–19 cm, lax, racemose, few-spiculate; branches mostly unbranched, flexuous, scabrid or almost smooth, bearing 1 or rarely 2 spikelets. Spikelets wedge-shaped, 1.6–3 cm, florets 5–11; rachilla scabrid; glumes lanceolate to oblong, apex obtuse to acute with ciliolate margin, lower glume 4–9 mm, upper glume 6–14 mm; lemmas elliptic-oblong, lowest 1.1–1.8 cm, herbaceous with scarious margins and apex, back scabrid on lateral veins and toward apex, otherwise smooth, apex narrowly obtuse or emarginate, often with mucro to 2.5 mm from sinus; palea 2/3–7/8 lemma length, longer than anthers, keels ciliate. Anthers 4–6.7 mm.
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