Perennial 240-740 mm high; older plants with long, horizontally creeping rhizomes. Leaf blade 50-300 x 5-8 mm, flat, sometimes inrolled, pectinately ciliate. Inflorescence branches whorled; spikelets very densely clustered on upper 1/3 of branches, leaving lower part bare. Spikelet 3.0-3.7 mm long; glumes unequal; lower glume 1/2 as long as spikelet; upper glume as long as spikelet; lemma little shorter than upper glume; anther 1.9-2.2 mm long.
Perennial, rhizomatous (older plants with long horizontally creeping rhizomes), up to 0.74 m high. Leaf blades 50-300 mm long, 5-8 mm wide, pectinately ciliate. Spikelets 3.0-3.7 mm long. Panicle whorled; spikelets very densely clustered on upper third of branches, leaving lower part bare; lower glume half the spikelet length; upper glume as long as spikelet.