Description:

• Perennial, tufted
• Leaf blade expanded; ligule an unfringed membrane
• Inflorescence a narrow panicle, branches arranged in rather remote whorls; spikelets pedicelled
• Spikelet 7-11 mm long, laterally compressed, disarticulating above glumes, florets falling together; glumes unequal, shorter to ± as long as spikelet, similar, shining, awnless; lower glume 1-nerved; upper glume 3-nerved
• Florets 2(-rarely 5), with or without rachilla prolonged and rudimentary floret; lowest or lower florets usually male, rarely bisexual, 5-9-nerved, glabrous or hairy, stoutly awned from lower third of back, awn geniculate, longer than body of lemma; upper floret bisexual, lemma firmer in texture than glumes, 5-7-nerved, glabrous to hairy, rounded on back, entire or shortly 2-lobed, awned from middle or upper third of back, awn straight; callus short, hairy; palea shorter than corresponding lemma, shortly bidentate at apex, ciliate on keels
• Lodicules 2, membranous
• Stamens 3
• Ovary ellipsoid, hairy; styles plumose
• Caryopsis ellipsoid, hairy
• x = 7 (polyploidy)

Nomenclature:

• *Arrhenatherum P.Beauv.
  • Palisot de Beauvois: 152 (1812)
  • Chippindall: 81 (1955)
  • Holub: 216 (1980)
  • Clayton & Renvoize: 124 (1986)
  • Gibbs Russell et al.: 55 (1990)
  • Watson & Dallwitz: 136 (1994)

Distribution & Notes:

• Global: Species ± 6, Europe, Mediterranean and Middle East
• Southern Africa: Species 1: *Arrhenatherum elatius (L.) Presl, naturalised, introduced and cultivated to a limited extent, occasionally found as an escape in parts of KwaZulu-Natal