Stout perennial; culms up to 3.5 m high, erect, densely bearded at the nodes, appressed hirsute below the panicle, otherwise smooth and glabrous. Leaf-blades flat or folded, up to c.1 m long, 4-30 mm wide, sparsely to densely hairy with tubercle-based hairs, gradually narrowed at the base into a false petiole, long-attenuate at the tip; sheaths densely villous. Panicle 20-55 cm long, dense; branches short, ascending, the lower racemes up to 10 cm long. Spikelets 2-3 mm long; lower glume coriaceous, reddish or brownish, obtuse, shortly hairy at the tip, sparsely long-ciliate on the back and margins especially in the lower half; upper glume similar; lower lemma oblong-elliptic, hairy towards the tip, entire, awnless; upper lemma similar.

Type: China, Galbraith 19285.

Distribution: Pakistan (Punjab & ? Baluchistan); tropical southeast Asia from the Himalayas to Malaysia.