Home Flora of Missouri
Home
Name Search
Families
Volumes
Eriochloa Kunth Search in The Plant ListSearch in IPNISearch in Australian Plant Name IndexSearch in Index Nominum Genericorum (ING)Search in NYBG Virtual HerbariumSearch in JSTOR Plant ScienceSearch in SEINetSearch in African Plants Database at Geneva Botanical GardenAfrican Plants, Senckenberg Photo GallerySearch in Flora do Brasil 2020Search in Reflora - Virtual HerbariumSearch in Living Collections Decrease font Increase font Restore font
 

Published In: Nova Genera et Species Plantarum (quarto ed.) 1: 94–95, pl. 30, 31. 1815. (29 Jan. 1816) (Nov. Gen. Sp. (quarto ed.)) Name publication detailView in BotanicusView in Biodiversity Heritage Library
 

Project Name Data (Last Modified On 7/9/2009)
Acceptance : Accepted
Project Data     (Last Modified On 7/9/2009)
Status: Introduced

 

Export To PDF Export To Word

64. Eriochloa Kunth (cup grass)

(Shaw and Webster, 1987)

Plants with C4 photosynthesis, annual (perennial elsewhere), forming tufts or less commonly clumps. Flowering stems erect from often spreading bases or mostly spreading, sometimes rooting at the lowermost nodes, glabrous or hairy. Leaf sheaths glabrous or hairy, rounded on the back, the ligule a line or band or hairs, sometimes with a minute membrane at the base. Leaf blades usually flat, hairy or rarely glabrous. Inflorescences dense or open panicles with several primary branches ascending, mostly unbranched, and consisting of spikelike racemes, the racemes appearing 1‑sided, with the spikelets occurring singly or paired along 1 side of the axis, the axis with a spikelet at the tip. Spikelets not subtended by bristles or spines, but with a small, cuplike ring or knoblike disk at the base (formed by fusion of the thickened joint at the spikelet base and the reduced, modified lower glume). Upper glume about as long as the rest of the spikelet, not inflated or saclike at the base, rounded to sharply pointed at the tip, awnless or with a short awn, hairy. Lowermost floret sterile, the palea absent or highly reduced, the lemma about as long as the rest of the spikelet, awnless or with a minute, awnlike point, hairy. Fertile (perfect) floret with the lemma slightly shorter than that of the staminate or sterile floret, bluntly to sharply pointed at the tip, awnless or more commonly with a short awn, nerveless or very faintly 5‑nerved, glabrous, dull, thickened and hard (usually somewhat bonelike) at maturity, the margins also thick, wrapped around the palea and fruit, but not enclosing the free palea tip. Paleas glabrous, dull, thickened and hard (usually somewhat bonelike) at maturity. Anthers 0.6–1.0 mm long. Fruits narrowly to broadly oblong‑elliptic in outline. About 30 species, nearly worldwide, mostly in tropical and subtropical regions.

The cuplike structure at the spikelet base is unique among Missouri grasses. In fresh plants, the cuplike base is usually yellow or a brighter yellowish green than the rest of the spikelet, and frequently a small bead of an oily liquid is found in it or at its tip.

 

Export To PDF Export To Word Export To SDD
Switch to indented key format
1 Lemma of the fertile floret with an awn 0.3–1.0 mm long 2 Eriochloa contracta
+ Lemma of the fertile floret awnless or with a minute, triangular point 0.1–0.3 mm long (2)
2 (1) Spikelets tapered to a sharp point at the tip, the fertile lemma 2.3–3.3 mm long, rounded, but with a minute, triangular point at the tip 1 Eriochloa acuminata
+ Spikelets narrowed to a blunt or sharp point at the tip, not tapered, the fertile lemma 3.5–5.0 mm long, angled to a broad point at the tip, but awnless 3 Eriochloa villosa
 
 
© 2024 Missouri Botanical Garden - 4344 Shaw Boulevard - Saint Louis, Missouri 63110