Culms clustered, erect or nearly so, 1–4 dm, very slender, glabrous to puberulent; lvs bright green or blue-green, crowded toward the base, the basal and cauline similar, erect to narrowly ascending, glabrous to long-pilose (as also the sheaths), mostly 8–20 cm × 2–5 mm, the longest ones ca 20 times as long as wide; primary panicle narrow and relatively few-fld, with crooked, often short and appressed pedicels, 3–8 cm, eventually exsert, not much exceeding the lvs; spikelets glabrous or minutely hairy, ellipsoid, 2.7–4.1 mm, the first glume membranous, ovate or triangular, a third as long; second glume and sterile lemma sharply veined, pointed, projecting 0.5–1.5 mm beyond the fertile lemma; autumnal phase similar, the panicles small and usually concealed among the lvs near the base; 2n=18. Dry or sandy soil, commonly in open woods; N.S. and Que. to Minn., s. to Ga. and Tex. (Dichanthelium d.)