Plants loosely cespitose, with-out rhizomes. Culms 40–125 cm, glabrous. Sheaths closed for less than 1/3 their length, glab-rous or pubescent, shredding into fibers; collars glabrous or pubescent; ligules 0.1–0.5 mm; blades 2–6(8) mm wide, flat or loosely convolute, abaxial sur-faces glabrous or sparsely pubescent, adaxial surfaces pubescent, veins 13–29, ribs obscure to prominent; abaxial sclerenchyma in strands; adaxial sclerenchymadeveloped; pillars or girders present at the major veins. Inflorescences 7–20 cm, open, with 1(2) branches per node; branches lax, spreading. Spikelets 8–12.5 mm, with (2)3–5 florets. Glumes glabrous, lanceolate to subulate; lower glumes (2)2.5–4 mm; upper glumes 3.5–5.5(6) mm; calluses much longer than wide, pubescent at least basally; lemmas 6–9 mm, lanceolate, puberulent, particularly towards the bases, sometimes slightly scabrous, particularly towards the apices, apices minutely bidentate, awned, awns 10–15 mm, slightly subterminal, flexuous, or kinked; paleas about as long as the lemmas, intercostal region puberulent distally; anthers (2)2.5–4 mm; ovary apices pubescent. 2n = 28.
Festuca subuliflora grows in shady sites in dry to moist forests, usually below 700 m. Its range extends from southwestern British Columbia to central California. Superficially, it resembles F. subulata; it differs in having more elongated and distinctly hairy calluses, and often in having softly pubescent foliage and more strongly ribbed blades.