Helictotrichon

Perennial, tufted. Leaf blade linear, expanded or folded, sometimes setaceous; ligule a hyaline or scarious, unfringed membrane. Inflorescence a narrow panicle, contracted or open, erect or nodding; spikelets solitary, pedicelled. Spikelet large, 7-30 mm long, laterally compressed, disarticulating above glumes and between florets; glumes +/- equal or unequal, usually shorter than spikelet, hyaline or subhyaline, acute or acuminate or shortly awned, +/- keeled; lower glume 1-3-nerved; upper glume 3(-7)-nerved. Florets 2-6, bisexual; uppermost floret male, sterile or reduced; rachilla hairy, rarely glabrous, sometimes produced into a short bristle beyond uppermost floret; lemma firmer than glumes, firmly membranous to leathery with scarious or hyaline tips, glabrous, rounded on back, acute or acuminate, 5-11-nerved, 2-lobed (rarely 4-lobed), lobes awnless or awned; central awn from upper part of back between lobes, awn longer than body of lemma, geniculate and twisted, or slightly so; callus hairy; palea shorter than lemma, 2-keeled, ciliate. Lodicules 2, large, hyaline. Stamens 3. Ovary hairy from above middle or at apex only; styles distinct, short, plumose. x= 7 (high polyploidy).