Perennial, without rhizomes; culms 1-2 m high, wiry, erect, bearded at the nodes. Leaf-blades up to 60 cm long and 15 mm wide; ligule short, scarious. Panicle lanceolate, 10-30 cm long, usually lax, sometimes dense, the branches simple, filiform and consipicuously whorled; racemes borne at the tips of the branches, composed of 2-4 spikelet pairs, with rufously ciliate internodes and pedicels. Sessile spikelet narrowly ovate, 3-4.5 mm long, the callus rufously bearded; lower glume coriaceous, glossy, dark brown to black, rufously pubescent mainly above the middle; upper lemma muticous or with an awn 7-17 mm long. Pedicelled spikelet similar in size to the sessile, but papyraceous, light brown and awnless. 2n=20.