Descr. Gram.: 27 (1802).- Type: Wennerberg s.n., China (lecto- LD).
Panicum ciliare Retz., Obs. Bot. 4: 16 (1786);
Digitaria marginata Link var nubica Stapf, FTA 9: 441 (1919).- Type: Kotschy 429, Sudan (isolecto- M,S);
Digitairia chrysoblephara Fig. & De Not., Mem. Acad. Sci. Torino, ser. 2, 14: 364, fig. 27 (1854).- Type: Figari, Sudan (syn- HAL).
Panicum adscendens Kunth, Nov. Gen. Sp. 1: 97 (1817).- Type: Humboldt & Bonpland, S America (iso- BM);
Digitaria adscendens (Kunth) Henrard, Blumea 1: 92 (1934).
Regional litterature: FWTA 453 (1972); Ghana grasses: 134 (1977); Gram. Cameroun: 326, fig. 68 (1992); Fl. Mauritania: 449 (1991); Fl. Ethiopia & Eritrea 7: 256, fig. (1995); Pl. Mauritanie: 301 (1998); Poac. Niger: 452, fig. (1999); Fl. Bénin: 198 (2006); Pl. Vasc. Guiné-Bissau: 165 (2006); Fl. Guinea Bissau: 135 (2008); Fl. Guinée: 455 (2009); Pl. Burkina Faso: 79 (2012); Fl. Chad (2013); Pl. Sudan & S Sudan: 125 (2015).
Description:
* Annual straggling branched decumbent rooting at lower nodes with geniculate culms up to 0.5 m, rooting at lower nodes. Leaves linear to linear lanceolate, expanded, flat and glabrous, 3- 25 cm long and 3-10 mm wide, hairy or glabrous, with scabrid sometimes wavy margins, base rounded with whitened colour; ligule small glabrous membrane; sheath slightly compressed, glabrous with hairy base.
* Inflorescence subdigitate with 2-12 slender stiffly ascending greenish racemes of 6-22 cm long along an axis of up to 2 (- 4) cm, in 1 (-3) verticelles; rachis narrowly winged, glabrous or with scattered hairs, scabrous on margins. Spikelets appressed, in pairs, pedicelled; pedicels unequal, the longest up to 2 mm long..
* Spikelets green, elliptic, acute, 2-3.5 mm long. Lower glume ovate, 0.2-0.4 mm long; upper glume lanceolate, acute, 2/3length of spikelet, 3 -veined, pubescent between veins. Lower lemma elliptic, acute, as long as spikelet, 7 -veined, with equidistant or unevenly spaced veins, puberulous, pubescent, setose, the upper pedicelled spikelet villous between veins with stiff yellowish hairs that are spread with maturity, glabrous or ciliate on margins; upper lemma elliptic, acute, 2-3.7 mm long, cartilaginous, thinner on margins, grey or dark brown, 3 -veined, margins flat, covering most of palea; ciliate.
Distribution West Africa: Cape Verde, Mauritania, Senegal, Gambia, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Mali, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Benin, Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, Cameroon, CAR, Sudan, South Sudan.
Distribution world-wide: Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Ethiopia, Uganda, DRC, Congo, NE, E and southern Africa, Asia; introduced in Australia and the Americas.
Note: D. ciliaris is widespread in the tropics but to a large extend in Africa replaced by D. nuda. It is extremely variable in the spacing of the nerves and occurrence of bristle-hairs in the lower lemma, in the presence of a ciliate frill around the spikelets at maturity, and in the presence of hairs on the rhachis (FEE).