Annual or short-lived perennial; culms 10–50 cm. high, tufted or geniculately ascending. Leaf-blades flat, 3–10 cm. long, 1–4 mm. wide. Panicle linear, spiciform, 2–16 cm. long, 5–10 mm. wide, the branches stiff, appressed to the axis, up to 2 cm. long (or the lowermost longer); pedicels 1–2 mm. long. Spikelets 5–30-flowered, narrowly ovate-oblong, 2.5–10 mm. long, 1.3–2 mm. wide, dark green, breaking up from the base, the rhachilla persistent; glumes ovate to broadly ovate, boat-shaped, subequal, 0.8–1.2 mm. long; lemmas very broadly ovate, 1.3–1.7 mm. long, cartilaginous, the nerves indistinct, closely imbricate, acute; palea scaberulous on the keels, persistent; anthers 2, 0.3 mm. long. Caryopsis globose, 0.5–0.6 mm. long. Fig. 62/1, p. 196.
