Plants forming dense hummocks (0.15–) 0.3–1.8 m high, 0.3–6 m wide, greyish or olive-green, sometimes with prop roots. Flowering culms 0.3–1 m high. Leaves: sheath densely woolly especially along margins; orifice woolly; blade extremely rigid, ±divaricate, 9–28 cm long, 0.8–1.5 mm wide, translucently dotted, woolly on pseudopetiole. Panicles dense, continuous, spiciform, 10–32 cm long, 1–2 cm wide; axis flattened or subterete; branches few, 2–3.5 cm long. Spikelets lanceolate or oblong, 10–17 mm long, 3–5 mm wide, usually closely 7–12-flowered; pedicel 1–5 mm long. Glumes ovate or oblong, 4.5–6 mm long, sometimes mucronulate, cartilaginous to indurated, 3-or 7-nerved, strongly keeled near apex, glabrous or ciliolate on margins. Callus minute, obtuse. Basal lemma 4.5–6 mm long, cartilaginous to indurated, not abruptly bitextured, hirsute near base and on submargins and midnerve in lower half, ciliate or ciliolate; lobes ±equal, subulate, 1–1.6 mm long. Palea about as long as lemma body, cartilaginous with hyaline flaps; keels winged, with wings entire, not exposed. Anthers 2–3 mm long.
A plant of hilly country and skeletal, shallow, gravellyor stony soils associated with sandstone, shales, quartzite, slates, laterite, schists,conglomerate, granite and siltstone.
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