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| Synonyms: |
Pseudobromus africanus (Hack.) Stapf Pseudobromus silvaticus K. Schum. |
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| Description: |
A caespitose perennial, with a short knotty rhizome. Culms up to 125 cm. tall, 2-7-noded, branched from the base, erect or sharply ascending, slender, wiry, faintly striate, usually glossy, glabrous. Leaf-sheaths slightly longer than the internodes, tight at first, later often slipping off the culm, scaberulous or smooth. Ligule 3-8 mm. long, obtuse to acuminate, glabrous. Leaf-laminae 5-45 x 0·3-1·5 cm., narrowly lanceolate to linear, base auricled, tapering to a setaceous point, usually expanded, rarely folded around the middle, somewhat rigid, dark green, scaberulous on the nerves especially on the upper surface, scabrous along the margins. Panicle up to 45 cm., long, terminal, lax, open, slightly nodding or erect; rhachis rather slender, terete or sometimes flattened, smooth or often scaberulous towards the apex; branches up to 20 cm. long, fascicled, rarely solitary, terete, flexuous, sparsely branched. Spikelets 7-10 mm. long, 1-flowered, with the rhachilla produced beyond the floret into a fine bristle (sometimes terminating in a reduced lemma), narrowly elliptic or narrowly ovate in outline, dark green, slightly laterally compressed to terete; extension of the rhachilla slightly longer than 1/2 the length of the spikelet. Glumes with the apex acute or rarely subobtuse, margins hyaline; the inferior 2·5-4·5(5·25) mm. long, 1-nerved (very rarely sub-3-nerved), lanceolate triangular; the superior (3)4·5-6·75 mm. long, 3-nerved (the lateral nerves sometimes evanescent), broadly lanceolate-triangular. Lemma 6-9 mm. long (excluding awn), 3-nerved, narrowly lanceolate; awn (8)14-20 mm. long. Palea c. as long or slightly longer than the lemma. Callus rounded, pilose, gibbous in lateral view. Anthers 2·5-4·75(6) mm. long. Caryopsis c. 6 mm. long, reniform in cross-section; embryo 1/6-1/5 the length of the caryopsis; hilum linear, stretching the whole length of the caryopsis. |
| Notes: | |
| Derivation of specific name: | africana: African |
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| Worldwide distribution: | Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique,South Africa, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe |
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| Insects associated with this species: | |
| Spot characters: | Display spot characters for this species |
| Literature: |
Burrows, J.E. & Willis, C.K. (eds) (2005). Plants of the Nyika Plateau Southern African Botanical Diversity Network Report No. 31 SABONET, Pretoria Page 348. Jackson, G. & Wiehe, P.O. (1958). An Annotated Check List of Nyasaland Grasses The Government Printer, Zomba, Nyasaland Page 55. As Pseudobromus sylvaticus Launert, E. (1971). Poaceae Flora Zambesiaca 10(1) Page 52. As Pseudobromus silvaticus Mapaura, A. & Timberlake, J. (eds) (2004). A checklist of Zimbabwean vascular plants Southern African Botanical Diversity Network Report No. 33 Sabonet, Pretoria and Harare Page 105. Strugnell, A.M. (2006). A Checklist of the Spermatophytes of Mount Mulanje, Malawi Scripta Botanica Belgica 34 National Botanic Garden of Belgium Page 148. |
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