Elastic grass

A short-lived (i.e. annual) or long-lived (i.e. perennial) tufted grass with flowering stems reaching up to 70 cm tall.
The flowering stems (i.e. culms) tend to be upright (i.e. erect) and hairless (i.e. glabrous). The tough, elastic, light green coloured leaves consist of a leaf sheath at the base, which encloses the stem, and a spreading leaf blade. Their leaf sheaths are folded with some long hairs on the margins. The leaf blades (up to 30 long and 3 mm wide) are long and narrow (i.e. linear) in shape and gradually narrow to a point at the tip (i.e. acute apex).
The branched seed-heads (i.e. inflorescences) are open panicles (5-30 cm long) and are borne at the tips of the flowering stems (i.e. culms). Their branches are very fine with a hairy tuft at their bases and sometimes also a ring of glands. The flower spikelets (4-16 mm long and 1-3 mm wide) are somewhat flattened, narrow (i.e. linear) to egg-shaped in outline (i.e. ovate) when young, and gradually become saw-toothed in appearance as they mature. They have 4-16 tiny flowers (i.e. florets) and are dark green or grey-green in colour. The tiny 'seeds' (i.e. grains or caryopses) are brown to reddish-brown in colour, with a pitted surface, and are enclosed within the remains of the papery floral bracts (i.e. palea and lemma).
A weed of roadsides, tracks, footpaths, gardens, lawns, disturbed sites, waste areas, crops and pastures that is particularly abundant in areas that undergo heavy traffic.