E-Flora BC: Electronic Atlas of the Flora of British Columbia

General:
Annual grass from fibrous roots, sometimes flowering as a winter annual; stems 40-150 cm tall.

Leaves:
Sheaths open; blades flat (in-rolled in bud), 5-20 mm wide; ligules membranous, scarcely 1 mm long; ear-shaped lobes at leaf-bases prominent.

Flowers:
Inflorescence a terminal spike, 5-12 cm long, awned or awnless, with 1 spikelet per node; spikelets 2- to 5-flowered, unstalked; glumes firm, keeled, strongly 3- (or more) nerved, sharp-pointed to awned, the awns 1 to several; lemmas broad, lopsidely keeled, several-nerved, the nerves non-convergent, 4-5 mm long, sharp-pointed to awned; lodicules oblong, slenderly lobed to fringed with hairs, about 1 mm long; anthers up to 1.5 mm long.