General:
Perennial, tufted grass from fibrous roots; stems usually enlarged and more or less bulbous at the base, up to 100 cm tall.

Leaves:
Sheaths smooth; blades flat, 4-8 mm wide, the margins rough; ligules blunt, subentire, sometimes the margins irregular-jagged, 2-3 (4) mm long; small ear-shaped lobes at the leaf-bases occasionally present, borne where the blades are freed from the sheaths.

Flowers:
Inflorescence a slender-cylindrical panicle, 4-11 (16) cm long, less than 1 cm wide when pressed; glumes usually short-hairy on the sides, strongly fringed with comblike hairs on the keels, 3-4 mm long, abruptly narrowed to the stout, slightly curved awns, the awns 1-1.5 (rarely 2) mm long; lemmas hairy, blunt and jagged, the midnerves slightly extending beyond the tips and bristlelike, scarcely 2 mm long; paleas nearly equal to the lemmas; anthers 1.6-2.3 mm long.

Source:  The Illustrated Flora of British Columbia