New! - Search other data sources for Schizachyrium yangambiense

Help - Wrong Description?

Kew Data Sources

Kew's Herbarium Catalogue
ePIC - Electronic Plant Information Centre

External Data Sources

Note - this takes you off of our website
Use your browser's back button to return to this page

GrassBase - The Online World Grass Flora

Descriptions

W.D. Clayton, M. Vorontsova, K.T. Harman & H. Williamson

© Copyright The Board of Trustees, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Schizachyrium yangambiense

HABIT Perennial; caespitose; clumped loosely. Rhizomes short. Culms decumbent; 100–200 cm long; rooting from lower nodes. Leaf-sheaths 4–6 cm long. Ligule a ciliolate membrane. Leaf-blades 7–15 cm long; 3–4 mm wide. Leaf-blade surface glabrous. Leaf-blade apex acute.

INFLORESCENCE Synflorescence compound; scanty. Inflorescence composed of racemes; terminal and axillary; subtended by a spatheole. Spatheole linear; 9–10 cm long.

Racemes 1; single; 3.5–11 cm long. Rhachis fragile at the nodes; semiterete; ciliate on margins. Rhachis hairs mainly at internode tip. Rhachis internodes clavate; 6 mm long. Rhachis internode tip crateriform; with scarious rim.

Spikelets appressed; in pairs. Fertile spikelets sessile; 1 in the cluster. Companion sterile spikelets pedicelled; 1 in the cluster. Pedicels linear; 7 mm long; ciliate; hairy at tip.

STERILE SPIKELETS Companion sterile spikelets well-developed; containing empty lemmas, or male; lanceolate; dorsally compressed; 6–7 mm long; shorter than fertile; deciduous with the fertile. Companion sterile spikelet glumes chartaceous; 3 -veined; glabrous; ciliolate on margins; acute; muticous. Companion sterile spikelet lemmas 2; enclosed by glumes.

FERTILE SPIKELETS Spikelets comprising 1 basal sterile florets; 1 fertile florets; without rhachilla extension. Spikelets lanceolate; dorsally compressed; 8–10 mm long; falling entire; deciduous with accessory branch structures. Spikelet callus pubescent; base obtuse; inserted.

GLUMES Glumes dissimilar; exceeding apex of florets; firmer than fertile lemma. Lower glume elliptic; 1 length of spikelet; chartaceous, or coriaceous; 2-keeled; keeled laterally; wingless. Lower glume intercarinal veins distinct. Lower glume surface glabrous. Lower glume margins ciliate. Upper glume lanceolate; membranous; 1-keeled.

FLORETS Basal sterile florets barren; without significant palea. Lemma of lower sterile floret oblong; hyaline. Fertile lemma oblong; hyaline; without keel. Lemma apex lobed; 2 -fid; incised 0.33 of lemma length; awned; 1 -awned. Principal lemma awn from a sinus; geniculate; 10–11 mm long overall; with twisted column. Column of lemma awn glabrous. Palea absent or minute.

DISTRIBUTION Africa: west-central tropical.

NOTES Andropogoneae. Germain 1999.

Please cite this publication as detailed in How to Cite Version: 3rd February 2016.