Erect, green to glaucous tufts, 50-150 cm. Leaf-sheath glabrous or slightly hairy. Ligule (2)-3-5 mm, ± rounded, finely denticulate, abaxially finely scabrid. Leaf-blade 15-40 cm × (2.5)-7-15 mm, ± finely scabrid on ribs; margins finely scabrid, sometimes with a few scattered hairs. Culm erect or decumbent and rooting at base, internodes glabrous. Panicle 14-32 cm, very variable in shape, loose or contracted, equilateral to secund; branches horizontal to ± erect, slender, finely scabrid. Spikelets (15)-20-30-(40) mm, 2-(3)-flowered, pendulous on fine unequal pedicels; falling intact at maturity. Glumes 9-11-nerved. Lemma 10-18 mm, ovate-lanceolate, glabrous, or with a few hairs towards base, apex obtuse or shallowly notched, red-brown, grey, yellow, white or blackish, usually awnless, but lowest or sometimes all florets in certain cultivars bearing a weak, straight or curved awn, not geniculate and scarcely twisted at base. Palea keels with 1 row of cilia, interkeel scabrid or glabrous. Anthers 2-4.2 mm. Caryopsis 4-9 × 1.5-3 mm.