Description :

• Perennial or annual, tufted, rhizomatous
• Leaf blade linear, expanded, folded or rolled; ligule an unfringed or fringed membrane
• Inflorescence an open or contracted panicle, often linear or oblong; spikelets all alike, pedicelled
• Spikelet 5-17 mm long, usually terete, laterally to not noticeably compressed, disarticulating above glumes, without rachilla extension; glumes ± equal to unequal, as long as to longer than spikelet, not gibbous, similar, awned or awnless, 1(7-nerved, equal to longer than spikelet
• Floret 1; lemma firmer in texture than glumes, thickly membranous to coriaceous, becoming indurated, rounded on back, margins slightly overlapping, involute or open, entire or bilobed, 3-7-nerved, awned from sinus or apical, not off-centre; awn usually conspicuous, longer than body of lemma, extending beyond glumes, geniculate, column twisted, sometimes hairy; callus pungent or rarely obtuse, hairy; palea not keeled, 2-nerved, at least half as long as lemma
• Lodicules 2 or 3, glabrous
• Stamens 3
• Ovary glabrous; stigmas rarely 3
• Caryopsis fusiform
• x = 9, 10, 11, 12, 22 (aneuploids, high polyploidy)

Nomenclature:

• Stipa L.
  • Linnaeus: 78 (1753)
  • Stapf: 571 (1899)
  • De Winter: 212 (1965)
  • Clayton: 114 (1970)
  • Clayton & Renvoize: 83 (1986)
  • Barkworth: 597 (1990)
  • Gibbs Russell et al.: 316 (1990)
  • Barkworth: 1 (1993)
  • Watson & Dallwitz: 908 (1994)

Distribution & Notes:

• Global : Species ± 300, tropical and temperate regions of both hemispheres
• Southern Africa : Species ± 5 (2 indigenous), northern provinces of South Africa, Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, Northern, Western and Eastern Cape