Paleotropics, including India eastward to Malesia and northern Australia, and many Pacific Islands. In the Hawaiian Islands,
indigenous to
Kaua`i, Moloka`i.
Perennial herbs with short, woody rhizomes clothed with brown fibers; culms solitary or few together, erect, 20-70 cm tall, triquetrous, smooth, the somewhat thickened base often with leaves.
Leaves
Leaves several, basal, shorter than the culm, blades narrowly linear, 5-7 mm wide, herbaceous, flat, plicate, sheaths pale green, tinged with purplish-pink
Flowers
Inflorescences umbelliform, simple, open or sometimes nearly headlike, the rays short, 6-10, 0-5 cm long, the spikes green, terminal and solitary on each ray, cylindrical or oblong, narrowed at the base, 1.5-3 cm long, 8-12 mm wide, densely bearing numerous spikelets; involucral bracts 4-10, the lower few longer than the inflorescence; spikelets bearing 4-7 glumes and 1-2(3) fertile flowers, spreading to ascending, linear-lanceolate, subterete, 4-6.5 mm long, ca. 1 mm in diam., rachilla winged, jointed above the prophyll; glumes green, glaucous and eventually tinged yellowish brown, membranous to thin and chartaceous, appressed, elliptic to oblong-elliptic, 3-3.4 mm long, 1-1.2 mm wide, inrolled, 3-4 nerved on both sides of midnerve, the keel green, convex, apex obtuse or abruptly acute; style c. 2 mm long, slightly longer than achene; stigmas 3, stamens 3.
Fruit
Achenes linear-oblong, trigonous, c. 2 mm long, c. 0.8 mm wide
