Tufted perennial, apparently, without rhizomes; culms 45-135 cm high, erect or geniculately ascending, slender or stout. Leaf-blades Pat, sometimes convolute, 15-30 cm long, 4-8(-12) mm wide, smooth or scabrid above, smooth beneath, sometimes the sheaths and blades villous. Spike 8-30 cm long erect, nodding or curved; rhachis joints scabrid along the margins. Spikelets 6-8-flowered, 20-30 mm long (excluding the awns); glumes unequal, elliptic-lanceolate, with prominent scabrid nerves, acute or acuminate, the lower 10-16.5 mm long, the upper 11-18 mm long; lemma elliptic, 12-14 mm long (excluding the awn), scabrid or puberulous on the back, produced at the tip into an awn (4-) 12-18 mm long; palea about three-quarters the length of the body of the lemma; anthers 3-4 mm long.

Fl. & Fr. Per.: July-August.

Type: Northwest India, Royle 150 (K, LIV), 178 (LIV).

Distribution: Pakistan (Punjab, N.W.F.P., Gilgit & Kashmir); Afghanistan and the Himalayas eastwards to Sikkim.

A very variable species ranging from small slender plants to tall robust ones; the leaves are usually flat, but are sometimes convolute; the spike is often rather lax but may be very dense (var. validum); pubescence is mostly short and sparse, but in some plants (var. thomsonii) the sheaths and blades are densely villous.

In his Annotated Catalogue, Stewart cites sheet 25056a from Swat under Agropyron thomsonii Hook.f., whereas it is in fact Agropyron semicostatum var. thomsonii, a quite different plant. Agropyron thomsonii has a curved awn and silky-villous lemmas; it does not occur in Pakistan.

1000-4000 m.