Chloris gayana
Chloris pectinata
Rhodes grass, Rhodes windmill-grass
comb windmill-grass
to 300 cm, erect.
20-75 cm, erect, often branched above.
glabrous or scabrous, often ciliate apically;
ligules ciliate;
blades to 30 cm long, 15 mm wide, scabrous.
glabrous;
ligules membranous, ciliate;
blades to 15 cm long, 2-5 mm wide, sometimes with basal hairs, otherwise glabrous or scabrous.
digitate, with 9-30 evidently distinct branches;
branches 8-20 cm, usually somewhat divaricate, spikelet-bearing to the base, averaging 10 spikelets per cm.
digitate, with 4-13 easily separable or evidently distinct branches;
branches 5-11 cm, initially erect, becoming divaricate, with 10-14 spikelets per cm.
strongly imbricate, tawny, with 1 bisexual and (1)2-4 usually staminate, sometimes sterile florets.
pectinate, diverging at a wide angle from the branch axes, with 1 bisexual and 1 staminate floret.
1.4-2.8 mm;
upper glumes 2.2-3.5 mm;
lowest lemmas 2.5-4.2 mm long, 0.7-1 mm wide, ovate to obovate or elliptic, somewhat gibbous, sides not grooved, pubescence variable, sides usually glabrous, sometimes scabrous or appressed pubescent, margins usually glabrous or appressed pubescent on the lower portions, sometimes throughout their length, sometimes with strongly divergent hairs distally, occasionally with strongly divergent hairs their entire length, divergent hairs, when present, 1+ mm, lemma apices inconspicuously bilobed, awned, awns 1.5-6.5 mm;
second florets staminate or sterile, 2.2-3.2 mm long, 0.3-1 mm wide, similar to the first floret but more cylindrical, not widened distally, inflated, if at all, only near the apices, inconspicuously bilobed, awned, awns 0.8-3.2 mm;
distal florets progressively smaller, longer than the subtending rachilla segment, awn-tipped or unawned.
1.4-2.5 mm;
upper glumes 2.9-4.3 mm;
lowest lemmas 3-6.2 mm long, 0.4-0.6 mm wide, linear to narrowly lanceolate, margins glabrous, scabrous, or with hairs less than 0.2 mm, lemma apices bilobed, lobes 0.5-1 mm, sometimes awned, central awns 4-37 mm, awns of lateral lobes, if present, less than 0.6 mm;
second florets 1.7-2.9 mm long, 0.2-0.3 mm wide, laterally compressed, bilobed, lobes 1/3–1/2 as long as the lemmas, awned, awns 4-10 mm.
1-1.5 mm long, about 0.5 mm wide.
about 2.3 mm long, about 0.3 mm wide, narrowly ellipsoid, trigonous.
= 20, 30, 40.
= unknown.
Chloris gayana
Chloris pectinata
Chloris gayana grows in warm-temperate to tropical regions throughout the world, including the southern United States. It is cultivated as a meadow grass in irrigated regions of the southwest.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Chloris pectinata is an Australian species that was collected around woolen mills in South Carolina in the first half of the twentieth century.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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