Eragrostis caesia Stapf

Gramineae, T. Cope. Flora Zambesiaca 10:2. 1999

Morphology General Habit

Densely caespitose perennial without rhizomes or stolons; culms up to 60 cm tall, erect, unbranched, glabrous at the nodes, eglandular; basal leaf sheaths glabrous, chartaceous, compressed and keeled, eglandular, persistent; ligule a line of hairs; leaf laminas 11–20 cm × 1.5–3 mm, linear and flat or more usually involute, filiform and flexuous, glabrous or pilose, eglandular.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Inflorescences

Panicle 8–15 cm long, linear to narrowly oblong with the branches appressed to the main axis (rarely somewhat spreading), the spikelets evenly distributed on pedicels 0.5–2 mm long, the primary branches not in whorls, terminating in a fertile spikelet, glabrous in the axils, eglandular.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Inflorescences Spikelets

Spikelets 4–7 × 1.5–2(2.4) mm, narrowly oblong, laterally compressed, (2)4–7-flowered, the florets tardily disarticulating from below upwards, the rhachilla persistent; glumes unequal, keeled, narrowly oblong-lanceolate in profile, glabrous, subacute at the apex, the inferior 0.8–1.6 mm long, reaching to between (1/4)1/3 and c. 1/2 the way along the adjacent lemma, the superior 1.4–2.2 mm long, reaching nearly to the middle of the adjacent lemma; lemmas 2.7–3 mm long, keeled, oblong-lanceolate in profile, membranous with distinct lateral nerves, ± appressed to the rhachilla, those in opposite rows not imbricate, the rhachilla visible between them, pale olive-green to dark leaden-grey, scaberulous on the keel and on the back above, with conspicuous dark oil glands along the lateral nerves, acute or acuminate and sometimes mucronate at the apex; palea deciduous with the lemma, glabrous on the flanks, the keels slender, wingless, puberulous; anthers 3, 1–1.4 mm long.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Fruits

Caryopsis not seen.