Enum. Hort. Berol. 91 (1809).- Type: Desfontaines s.n., Algeria (holo- P).
Panicum debile Desf., Fl Atlant. 1: 59 (1798)
Digitaria variabilis Fig. & De Not., Mem. Acad. Sci. Torino, ser. 2, 14: 357, fig. 23 (1854).- Type: Figari, Sudan (holo- FI, iso- K)
Digitaria decipiens Fig. & De Not., Mem. Acad. Sci. Torino, ser. 2, 14: 359, fig. 24 (1854).- Type: Figari, Sudan
Regional litterature: Fl. Agrost. Congo Belge 2: 43 (1834); Fl. Nigeria: 59 (1970); FWTA: 454 (1972); Ghana grasses: 134 (1977); FTEA: 637 (1982); Fl. Mauritania: 449 (1991); Gram. Cameroun: 321, fig. 68 (1992); Poac. CI: 442, fig. (1995); Fl. Ethiopia & Eritrea 7: 252, fig. (1995); Pl. Mauritanie: 301 (1998); Poac. Niger: 457, fig. (1999); Fl. Bénin: 198 (2006); Fl. Guinée: 455 (2009); Pl. Burkina Faso: 80 (2012); Fl. Chad (2013); Pl. Sudan & S Sudan: 125 (2015).
Description:
* Tufted annual, to 0.6 m high. Culms geniculate ascending from a lax straggling and decumbent base, rooting at the lower nodes. Leaves glabrous with fine midrib, 3-13 cm long and 2-6 mm wide, scabrid margins, base passing directly into sheath; ligule a truncate pale membrane; upper sheaths sometimes glabrous, but often the lower ones conspicuously hairy.
* Inflorescence a fascicle of 3-12 flexuous racemes, digitate or borne along a central axis of 0-6 cm long. Racemes 3-16 cm long, the spikelets paired along the triquetrous rhachis, wingless
* Spikelets narrowly lanceolate, 2.3-3.6 mm long, elongated internode between glumes of 0.1-0.3 mm long, rostrate. Lower glume a tiny truncate ovate scale of 0.2-0.3 mm long; upper glume lanceolate, as long as spikelet, prominently 5-nerved, acuminate, hairy between veins. Lower lemma lanceolate, acute, shorter than upper glume, 7-nerved, hairy between veins, with hooked hairs (curled tip); upper lemma elliptic, acute, 2-4.5 mm long, cartilaginous, thinner on margins, light grey or purple, margins flat, covering most of palea.
Distribution West Africa: Mauritania, Senegal, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Mali, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Benin, Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Sudan, South Sudan.
Distribution world-wide: Algeria, Tunesia, Ethiopia, DRC, Congo and E and southern Africa.