Rev. Gen. Pl. 2: 794 (1891).- Type: Ahles & Bell 15602, USA (neo- GH).
Ischaemum secundatum Walt., Fl. Carol. 249 (1788).
Regional litterature: FTA 9: 579 (1919); Fl. Gabon 5: 28, tab. 4 (1962); FWTA: 435 (1972); Ghana grasses: 247, fig 89 (1977); Gram. Togo: 329, fig. (1983); Fl. Mauritania: 411, fig (1991); Fl. Ethiopia & Eritrea 7: 244, fig (1995); Gram. Cameroun: 300, fig. 65 (1992); Fl. Bénin: 247, fig. (2006); Poac. CI: 346, fig. (1995); Pl. Mauritanie: 297 (1998); Poac. Niger: 391, fig. (1999) ; Pl. Burkina Faso: 116 (2012); Fl. Chad (2013).
Description:
* Robust vigorously creeping, mat-forming perennial with stout branched stolons rooting at the nodes and producing fan shaped tufts of leaves, up to 0.6 m high. Culms erect, compressed and smooth. Leaves linear 2-15 cm long and 4-9 mm broad, with distinctly obtuse or rounded tip, folded at first, later expanded, glabrous with smooth or slightly scabrid margins; base rounded; ligule a short fringe of hairs; sheath strongly compressed and keeled, especially the basal ones, often diverging from the culm. Roots stout.
* Inflorescence spike-like terminal panicle 2.5-8 cm long, often partially exerted from the uppermost leaf, the thick swollen spongy central axis flattened and smooth on one side and hollowed into two rows of deep cavities on the other, each containing a reduced raceme with a solitary spikelet.
* Spikelet lanceolate, 4-5 mm long, glabrous. Lower glumes reduced to a scale; upper glume as long as spikelet, boat-shaped. Lower lemma ovate lanceolate; upper lemma lanceolate, acute, sub coriaceous, pale yellow, shiny and finely pubescent towards the tip.
Distribution West Africa: Mauritania, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Benin, Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad; introduced in Cape Verde, Mauritania, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Niger.
Distribution world-wide: Americas; introduced in Ethiopia, DRC and Kenya and southern Africa, Asia, Australia.