Echinochloa muricata
Echinochloa esculenta
American barnyard-grass, awn barnyard grass, rough barnyard grass
Japanese millet
80-160 cm, erect or spreading, sometimes rooting at the lowest nodes, often developing short axillary flowering shoots at most upper nodes when mature;
lower nodes glabrous or puberulent;
upper nodes glabrous.
80-150 cm tall, 4-10 mm thick, glabrous.
glabrous;
ligules absent;
blades 1-27 cm long, 0.8-30 mm wide.
glabrous;
ligules absent, ligule region sometimes pubescent;
blades 10-50 cm long, 5-25 mm wide.
of primary culms 7-35 cm, rachises and branches glabrous or hispid, hairs to 3 mm, papillose-based;
primary branches 2-8 cm, usually spreading and rather distant, often with secondary branches.
7-30 cm, dense, rachis nodes densely hispid, hairs papillose-based, internodes scabrous;
primary branches 2-5 cm, erect or spreading, simple or branched, often incurved at maturity, nodes hispid, hairs papillose-based, internodes usually scabrous;
longer pedicels 0.5-1 mm.
2.5-5 mm, disarticulating at maturity, usually purple or streaked with purple, usually hispid, hairs papillose-based.
3-4 mm long, 2-2.5 mm wide, not or only tardily disarticulating at maturity, obtuse to shortly acute, purplish to blackish-brown at maturity.
about as long as the spikelets;
lower florets sterile;
lower lemmas unawned or awned, awns to 16 mm;
lower paleas well-developed;
upper lemmas broadly obovoid or orbicular, narrowing to an acute or acuminate coriaceous portion that extends into the membranous tip, boundary between the coriaceous and membranous portions not marked by minute hairs;
anthers 0.4-1.1 mm.
narrower and shorter than the upper lemmas;
lower florets sterile;
lower lemmas usually unawned;
lower paleas shorter and narrower than the lemmas;
upper lemmas longer and wider than the upper glumes, broadly ovate to ovate-orbicular, shortly apiculate, exposed distally at maturity;
anthers 1-1.2 mm.
1.2-2.5 mm, broadly obovoid or spheroid, yellowish;
embryos 1.4-2 mm, 80-91% as long as the caryopses.
1.2-2.3 mm, brownish;
embryos 84-96% as long as the caryopses.
= 36.
= 54.
Echinochloa muricata
Echinochloa esculenta
Echinochloa muricata is native to North America, growing from southern Canada to northern Mexico in moist, often disturbed sites (but not rice fields). It resembles E. crus-galli in gross morphology and ecology, but differs consistently by the characters used in the key. The two varieties tend to be distinct, but there is some overlap in both morphology and geography.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Echinochloa esculenta was derived from E. crus-galli in Japan, Korea, and China. It is cultivated for fodder, grain, or birdseed. It has sometimes been included in E. frumentacea, from which it differs in its brownish caryopses and longer pedicels. Hybrids between E. crus-galli and E. esculenta are fully fertile, but those with E. frumentacea are sterile.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
1. Spikelets 2.5-3.8 mm long; lower lemmas unawned or awned, the awns to 10 mm long | var. microstachya |
1. Spikelets 3.5-5 mm long; lower lemmas usually awned, the awns 6-16 mm long | var. muricata |
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