It is an annual grass that grows in tufts from 20 to 130 centimetres high.

It has green flowers that occur in an open panicle.

[2][3] This species was first published by Rudolf Albert Wolfgang Herrmann in 1910.

[4] Its only synonym is Setaria buchananii, published by Albert Spear Hitchcock in 1927.

[5] It occurs in Western Australia[2] and the Northern Territory.