Habit:		Glabrous glaucous perennial, with horizontal creeping rhizomes, growing in large clumps.
Culms:		Erect, 60-150 cm. tall.
Blades:		10-25 cm. Iong, 6-16 mm. wide, flat.
Sheaths:	Longer than the internodes or the upper shorter, usually smooth.
Ligule:		Thin, 2-6 mm. Iong.
Inflorescence:	Panicle 9-16 cm. Iong, dense, narrow, 1-2 cm. thick, the branches spreading
		during anthesis, contracted later, the lower as much as 5 cm. Iong.
Spikelets:	Crowded, 4-6 mm. Iong, lanceolate, pale, disarticulating above the glumes,
		with a terminal fertile floret, and 2 sterile florets below.
Glumes:	        About 5 mm. Iong, narrow, acute, the keel scabrous, very narrowly winged, 3-nerved, scabrous.
Lemmas:	        Sterile lemmas reduced to minute hairy scales, 1 mm. Iong; fertile lemma
		lanceolate, 4 mm. Iong, awnless, obscurely 3-5-nerved, with a few appressed hairs.
Palea:		Faintly 2-nerved.
Habitat:	Wet places, marshes, riverbanks. June-August.
Use: 		Because of its ability to withstand long periods of flooding, this grass
		is important in plantings in wet areas.
Synonyms: 	Phalaris arundinacea L. var. picta L.