Bot. Mag. Tokyo55: 311 (1941).- Type: König s.n., India (holo- C).
Poa panicea Retz., Obs. Bot. 3: 11 (1783).
Regional litterature: FWTA: 398 (1972); FTEA: 279 (1974); Ghana grasses: 176 (1977); Gram. Togo: 245 (1983); Fl. Ethiopia & Eritrea 7: 104, fig (1995); Fl. Zambesiaca 10,2: 26 (1999); Fl. Bénin: 214 (2006); Pl. Sudan & S Sudan: 136 (2015).
Description:
* Lax tufted annual, 0.2-1 m. Culms terete to slightly compressed, geniculate ascending. Leaves linear, 15-25 cm long and up to 7 mm wide, flat and glabrous to very sparsely hairy, with scabrid margins; long-attenuate, base barely rounded; ligule a distinct inconspicuous pale membrane; sheath glabrous and somewhat compressed. Roots fine.
* Inflorescence elliptic, brush like, often purplish, 20-30 cm long, with long slender one-sided racemes of 4-11 cm long, ascending from the central axis.
* Spikelets narrowly elliptic, 1.5-2 mm long, 2-3-flowered. Lower glume lanceolate, 0.8-1 mm long; upper glume narrowly oblong, obtuse and mucronate, 1-1.3 mm long. Lemmas elliptic-oblong, 1 mm long, minutely hairy, bluntly 2-toothed.
Distribution West Africa: Introduced in Cape Verde, Ghana, Togo, Benin, CAR, Sudan, South Sudan.
Distribution world-wide: Tropical Asia and Americas; introduced in Egypt, Uganda and E and southern Africa.