Slender tufted perennial with short rhizome. Culms rigid, subterete to biconvex, nodeless, striate, glabrous, smooth, 20–55 cm high, 1–2 mm diam. Leaves basal; blade flattened, shorter and broader than culms, to 2.5(–4.5) mm wide; sheath straw-coloured, dull. Inflorescence oblong in outline, loose, with distant drooping branches to c. 20 cm long, 15–30 cm long, 1–2.5 cm diam.; lowest involucral bract much shorter than inflorescence. Spikelets rather few, 3–5-flowered, 4–5 mm long; glumes 4 or 5, acute, red-brown, smooth or minutely scabrous, margins with scattered cilia; fertile glumes 2.5–4.5 mm long. Nut obovoid, coarsely reticulate, strongly 3-ribbed, the ribs somewhat winged, smooth between the ribs, white-hispid at very apex, ± shining, straw-coloured to red-brown, 1.8–3.0 mm long, c. 1 mm diam. Flowers spring.
GleP, Brid, VVP, GipP, WaP, GGr, WPro. Also WA, SA. Rare, confined to a few sites in the south-west (Portland-Nelson area, Port Campbell National Park) and the northern part of Wilsons Promontory. Occurs in wet sandy areas in heathlands and heathy swamps.
