28. Phalaris L. (canary grass)
(Anderson, 1961; Baldini, 1995)
Plants annual or perennial, forming tufts, clumps, or
colonies. Flowering stems erect or ascending, sometimes from spreading bases,
glabrous. Leaf sheaths rounded on the back, glabrous or roughened. Leaf blades
flat, glabrous or roughened along the margins and on the upper surface.
Inflorescences dense, narrow panicles, in most species appearing as dense,
ovoid to nearly cylindrical spikes, the branches erect or strongly ascending,
but not fused with the main axis, often short and not apparent at flowering
time without dissecting the inflorescence. Spikelets strongly flattened
laterally, disarticulating above the glumes, with 3 florets, the uppermost
perfect and the lower 2 sterile (0 or only 1 sterile floret elsewhere). Glumes
longer than the rest of the spikelet, similar in size and shape, elliptic or
narrowly ovate, sharply pointed at the tip, awnless, strongly keeled and
usually 3‑nerved, glabrous, roughened, or hairy, the midnerve (keel)
slightly to strongly winged (except in P. arundinacea). Sterile florets
sometimes inconspicuous, the lemmas much shorter and narrower than those of the
fertile floret. Lemma of the fertile floret elliptic to ovate, sharply pointed
at the tip, awnless, faintly 5‑nerved, glabrous or more commonly hairy,
becoming shiny at maturity. Paleas about as long as the lemmas, faintly 1‑
or 2‑nerved. Stamens 3. Fifteen to 22 species, nearly worldwide, mostly
in temperate regions.