Dactyloctenium

Description

Dactyloctenium, is a genus of herbaceous plants belonging to the family of the Poaceae . 1 It is native to Africa and Australia. They are annual plants, extending by short stolons and forming radial mats, the erect portions of the stems 2-50 cm long, glabrous, solid; conspicuous knots; hermaphrodite plants. Carinated pods, glabrous to pustular-hairy; ligule a membrane, ca 0.5 mm long; linear, 1-7 cm long and 1-7 mm wide, papillose-hairy, occasionally glaucous. Inflorescence a whorl2-4 sessile, unilateral spikes, the axis prolonged as a naked tip beyond the spikelets; spikelets ca 4 mm long, gray to purple, sessile, densely imbricated in 2 rows along the underside of the rachis, laterally compressed, carinated, with several bisexual florets, the most superior sterile; disarticulation generally above the lower glume, the rest of the spikelet deciduous as a unit and the upper glume and the deciduous slogans of the rachillae , the paleae remaining; glumes 2, 1-nerves, broad, lower ovate, 2 mm long, apiculate, upper broadly ovate, ca 3 mm long, truncated, with a short, thick, divergent edge; florets3; slogans strongly compressed, ovate, 2-3 mm long, acuminate, the keel strongly arched, scabriated, the midline conspicuous, green, the lateral ridges inconspicuous; palea 2-carinated, 3-nerves; lodules 2, truncated; stamens 3, anthers ca 0.4 mm long, yellow; styles 2. Fruit an utricle ; widely ovate seed, truncated, strongly striated; thin and delicate pericarp, evanescent.