Rhizomes short, thick, woody. Basal sheaths prominent, brown or reddish brown, dull, not fibrillose, retaining dried leaf blades. Culms densely tufted, rigid, acutely trigonous, or subterete in lower part, (2-)6-75 cm tall, 1-2.5 mm in diam. Leaves basal, shorter than culms; blade flat, 2-4 mm wide, midrib distinct abaxially. Inflorescence a dense or slightly loose panicle, brown, 1-3.5 × 0.6-1.2 cm; inflorescence branches simple, obliquely ascending, decreasing in length toward apex; lowest involucral bract glumelike, apex aristate. Terminal spikelets of inflorescence branches male, lower ones bisexual or unisexual. Bisexual spikelets with 1 basal female flower and 2 or 3(-6) distal male flowers. Glumes brown, with green midvein, ovate-oblong, 2.6-5.1 × 1.7-3.5 mm, margin hyaline or not, apex acute or aristate. Prophylls pale brown, oblong or oblong-lanceolate, 2.7-5 mm, membranous, 2-keeled, keels scabrid, margins open to base. Nutlets narrowly oblong, trigonous, 1.7-4 mm, beak to 1 mm, very shortly stipitate. Sterile rachilla sometimes present in female spikelets, to 1/3 as long as nutlet. Stigmas 3. Fl. and fr. May-Sep.

Moist habitats, among scrub; 700-5200 m. Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan, Xinjiang, Xizang, Yunnan [Afghanistan, India (Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand), Kashmir, Kyrgyzstan, Nepal, Pakistan, Tajikistan].