Techniques are disclosed for signaling a pattern of cyclic shifts and orthogonal cover codes for use by a wireless device in multi-layer transmissions. In one example method, a signal includes B bits for identifying a reference signal is received, wherein each of several available reference signals is defined by a cyclic shift and an orthogonal cover code. The B bits are used to identify the cyclic shift and orthogonal cover code according to pre-determined tables that map each value of the B bits to a pattern of cyclic shift and orthogonal cover code combinations for a multi-layer transmission scheme. The patterns for the multi-layer transmission scheme include first and second patterns based on the same cyclic shifts, but where some, but not all, of the cyclic shifts in the first pattern are associated with the same corresponding orthogonal cover codes in the second pattern.