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General:
Perennial, densely tufted grass from fibrous roots, sometimes from slender stolons; stems erect, smooth, 20-100 cm tall.
Leaves:
Sheaths open, rough; leaves mostly at or near the base; blades smooth to more or less rough, usually in-rolled, appearing bristlelike, smooth below, up to 20 cm long, 0.3-2 mm wide; ligules blunt to pointed, 1-2.5 mm long.
Flowers:
Inflorescence a loose, open, somewhat nodding panicle, to 15 cm long, 5-15 cm wide, the branches spreading, smooth or sparsely more or less prickly, the lowest ones in clusters of 2 to 5; spikelets purplish or silvery, 4-7 mm long, rarely rooting from apical bulbils, these small bulbs produced above ground, often on the flowering stem; rachillas prolonged by less than 1/4 the length of the upper florets; glumes 1-nerved, egg-shaped to lanceolate, sharp-pointed, the keels smooth, the lower ones 3-4.5 mm long, the upper ones long-pointed, 3.6-5.3 mm long; lemmas egg-shaped to cylindrical, more or less rough, squared-off and minutely toothed at the ends, 3-6 mm long, awned from near the base, the awns twisted below midlength, the top half somewhat divergent or abruptly bent 5-7 mm long, surpassing the lemmas by 1-5 mm, the callus hairs about 1 mm long; anthers linear, 2-3 mm long.
Source: The Illustrated Flora of British Columbia
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