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Herbs annual, 20-100 cm tall. Stem branched from base; branches alternate, spreading, green, white or purple-red striate, hispid or subglabrous. Leaves spreading or slightly curved, filiform-terete, 2-5 cm × 0.5-1.5 mm, hispid, base slightly expanded, decurrent, margin membranous, apex spinose mucronate. Inflorescence spikelike; bracts and bractlets tightly appressed to rachis; bracts ovate, abaxially longitudinally keeled, margin membranous, apex spinose mucronate; bractlets narrowly lanceolate, apex spinose mucronate. Perianth segments ovate-lanceolate, membranous, hardened in fruit, abaxially crested; portion of segment above crest inflexed, with others forming a plane surface tightly appressed to utricle or sometimes connivent distally into a small cone, subleathery, apex acute, membranous. Anthers 1-1.5 mm. Stigmas filiform, 1.5-2 × as long as style. Seed horizontal or oblique. Fl. Jul-Sep, fr. Sep-Oct.
Young plants with a strong, erect, monopodial stem, later becoming more bushy-branched; leaves somewhat dilated at the base; bracts ± appressed, imbricate, short, almost subulate, exceeding the bracteoles; sep often connate with the bracteoles, wingless or with a small, erose wing; embryo annular; 2n=18, otherwise much like S. tragus. Native of Siberia, well established as a weed on the Great Plains, and e. occasionally to Minn., Io., Ill., and even Vt.
An annual herb. It grows 20-100 cm high. The stem branches from the base. The branches are alternate. The leaves are spreading and slightly curved. They are narrow. They are 2-5 cm long by 1 mm wide.
