Culms to 2 m, 3–6 mm in diam.; internodes glossy, glabrous, subsolid, with small lumen; nodes flat. Culm sheaths leathery, glossy, fragile, margins usually densely ciliate; auricles absent or minute; oral setae sometimes developed, few, dark brown, rigid, scabrid; ligule truncate or slightly arcuate, very short, hirtellous, ciliolate; blade erect, initially rosy red, ovate-lanceolate, thinly papery, glabrous, base broad and amplexicaul, apex long acuminate. Leaves ca. 3 per ultimate branch; sheath obscurely striate on upper part, margins densely brown ciliate; auricles usually absent; oral setae few or absent, dark brown or straw-colored, rigid, scabrid; ligule short, hirtellous, ciliolate; pseudopetiole 1–4 mm, hirtellous toward apex; blade lanceolate or oblong-lanceolate, 14–29 × 1–5 cm, glabrous, secondary veins 6–9 pairs, tessellations rectangular, apex caudate. Panicle spreading, purple, 7–8 cm; peduncle to 8.5 cm, glabrous, axis and branches slender, glabrous. Spikelets oblong-lanceolate, to 1.5 cm, slightly compressed; pedicels 3–15 cm, pulvinate; florets ca. 4. Rachilla internodes glabrous on side facing floret, otherwise scabrous. Glumes 2, glabrous; lower glume 5–5.5 mm, apex obtuse; upper glume 6.5–8 mm, apex acute; lemma lanceolate, 6.5(–7) mm, thinly papery, fragile, glabrous, 5-veined, apex obtuse; palea slightly longer or sometimes shorter than lemma, glabrous, keels distally ciliate; lodicules transparent, anterior ca. 1.3 mm, posterior slightly longer. Anthers ca. 5 mm. Ovary fusiform, dorsi-ventrally compressed, subglabrous; stigmas 2.

* Open forests, thickets; ca. 500 m. Hong Kong.