Perennial, rarely annual, tufted and erect, forming tussocks, rarely trailing, rhizomatous, never aromatic
Leaf blade linear, usually flat, rarely folded; ligule a scarious unfringed membrane, truncate or rounded
Inflorescence of paired, short racemes enclosed by a spatheole; this crowded into a large leafy false panicle; racemes short, with 1 or 2 homogamous pairs of spikelets at base of lower raceme and 0-2 at base of upper raceme, these spikelets male or barren, awnless, raceme-bases flattened or terete, sometimes deflexed at maturity, pedicels and internodes linear; spikelets in pairs, in long-short combination: one sessile, the other pedicelled
Sessile spikelet narrowly lanceolate to lanceolate-oblong, dorsiventrally compressed or terete, hairy or glabrous; glumes ± equal, very dissimilar; lower glume as long as spikelet, lanceolate, truncate or acute, rarely produced into 2 short awns, broadly rounded or flattened on back; upper glume obtuse to acute or mucronate, awnless
Florets 2; lower floret sterile, reduced to a lemma, awnless; upper floret bisexual; lemma stipiform, less firm than glumes towards base, hyaline, 2-lobed, awned; awn stout, geniculate, column hairy, twisted; callus blunt to pungent, hairy, applied obliquely to apex of internode with its tip free; palea 0 or reduced
Lodicules 2, cuneate, truncate or emarginate
Stamens 3
Ovary glabrous
Caryopsis oblong
Pedicelled spikelet 3-8(-10) mm long, usually longer than sessile spikelet, narrowly lanceolate, acute, hairy or glabrous, male or sterile; callus 0; lower glume awnless or awned; upper glume awnless
x = 10, 15 (polyploidy)
Nomenclature:
Hyparrhenia Fourn.
Fournier: 51 (1886)
Stapf: 336 (1898) under Andropogon L.
Chippindall: 509 (1955)
Clayton: 38 (1969)
Clayton & Renvoize: 788 (1982)
Clayton & Renvoize: 354 (1986)
Gibbs Russell et al.: 182 (1990)
Watson & Dallwitz: 483 (1994)
Distribution & Notes:
Global: Species ± 55, mostly in Africa, few species in other tropical regions and the Mediterranean
Southern Africa: Species 20, widespread
References:
CHIPPINDALL, L.K.A. 1955. A guide to the identification of grasses in South Africa. In D. Meredith, The grasses and pastures of South Africa. Central News Agency, Cape Town
CLAYTON, W.D. 1969. A revision of the genus Hyparrhenia. Kew Bulletin. Additional series 2
CLAYTON, W.D. & RENVOIZE, S.A. 1982. Flora of tropical East Africa. Gramineae (Part 3)
CLAYTON, W.D. & RENVOIZE S.A. 1986. Genera graminum. Grasses of the world. Kew Bulletin. Additional series 13
FOURNIER, E.P.N. 1886. Mexicanas plantas 2. Ex Typographeo reipublicae, Paris
GIBBS RUSSELL, G.E., WATSON, L., KOEKEMOER, M., SMOOK, L., BARKER, N.P., ANDERSON, H.M. & DALLWITZ. M.J. 1990. Grasses of southern Africa. Memoirs of the Botanical Survey of South Africa No. 58
STAPF, O. 1898-1900. Gramineae. Flora capensis 7
WATSON, L. & DALLWITZ, M.J. 1994. The grass genera of the world, revised edn. CAB International, Oxon
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