Lepidosperma elatius

Tall, tussock-forming perennial with short rhizome. Culms rigid, erect, biconvex, or convex on 1 face and flat on the other, or margins flat with a central biconvex ridge, ± striate, glabrous, smooth, 70–180 cm high, 5–15 mm wide; margins scabrous. Leaf-blades ± flat, shorter than culms, 6–20 mm wide; sheaths reddish, straw-coloured above, usually not viscid, ± shining. Inflorescence ovate to oblong in outline, with branches drooping, 18–65 cm long, 5–20 cm diam.; involucral bract shorter than inflorescence. Spikelets numerous, 3–7 mm long; glumes 4–7, often mucronate, puberulous, red-brown, the 1 or 2 lowest empty, shorter than fertile glumes, acute; fertile glumes 3–6 mm long, acute to long-acute; hypogynous scales 6, white to pale brown, from one-quarter to one-third length of nut. Nut ovoid to narrow-ellipsoid, greyish to red-brown, smooth, shining, 2.0–3.0 mm long, 1.3–1.5 mm diam. Flowers spring–summer.