A coarse perennial, up to over 4 ft. high, closely tufted on a short rhizome. Culms geniculately ascending from short-sheathed tufts of leaves, 4–6-noded, branched from the lower 1 or 2 nodes, uppermost internode (peduncle) up to over 1 1/2 ft. long, prominently striate, scaberulous and slightly villose close to the inflorescence, other internodes densely bearded at the nodes and usually tomentose below them for a short distance, otherwise glabrous and smooth, the lowest 1 or 2 often hard and bared by the detachment of the sheaths. Leaf-sheaths rather loose (the lower) or tight, terete, with densely ciliate margins, otherwise glabrous or hairy with tubercle-based hairs, prominently striate, the lowest of a bunch only 1–2 in. long, finely keeled, widened at the base and there appressed-hairy, the outermost at length flattened out, not breaking up into fibres; ligule a densely ciliate rim; blade linear from a slightly narrowed base, long-tapering to a slender point, flat, over 1 ft. long by 3 1/2–4 lin. wide, slightly glaucous, with fine tubercle-based hairs on the face, very rough upwards, particularly along the margins, midrib very slender, often prominent downwards on the back. Inflorescence a very dense cylindrical false spike, 4–6 in. long by 3–3 1/2 lin. wide (exclusive of the bristles); axis obscurely angular, tomentellous; branches reduced to closely packed sessile clusters of mostly 2 fertile spikelets; bristles somewhat rigid, scabrid, 6–8 to each cluster, greenish, 2–3 lin. long; pedicels reduced to minute stumps with whitish discoid tips. Spikelets obovoid-oblong to oblong, rather obtuse or only obscurely and minutely apiculate, 1 1/4–1 1/2 lin. long by 3/4 lin. wide, moderately turgid, 1 lin. wide in profile, very smooth, pale-greenish to whitish, glabrous. Glumes membranous; lower broadly ovate, obtuse, 5-nerved, one-third to half the length of the spikelet; upper broadly elliptic, very obtuse, hardly apiculate, 7-nerved, one-fifth to one-sixth (or even less) shorter than the upper floret. Lower floret ♂: valve similar to the upper glume, but narrower, 5-nerved and as long as the spikelet; valvule elliptic-oblong, almost equalling the valve, marginate; anthers almost 1 lin. long, orange. Upper floret hermaphrodite, slightly shorter than the lower: valve ovate-oblong, subacute, 1/2 lin. wide in back view, semi-ovate and 1/2 lin. wide in profile, almost white, sometimes with a brown or purplish-black blotch at the tip, finely granulate; valvule very narrow and convex as seen between the parallel involute margins of the valve.
