Description: Annuals or short-lived perennials.
Inflorescence a compound spike, the spikelets in dense, sessile, globose or oblong clusters along a simple or branched axis.
Spikelets small, laterally compressed; florets several, bisexual; rachilla disarticulating above the glumes and between the lemmas. Glumes keeled, persistent, 1-nerved. Lemmas acuminate-awned, rounded on the back, 3-nerved. Palea 2-fid, winged on the keels, wings embracing the base of the adjoining floret in the spikelet, the 2 narrow inner wings enclosing the grain.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 4 species, Africa, Asia & Australia. Australia: 1 species (native).
Text by S. W. L. Jacobs & K. L. McClay
Taxon concept:
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