FTA 9: 190 (1917).- Type: Pobeguin 1791, Guinea (holo- K).
Schizachyrium alatum Jacques-Félix, Rev. Int. Bot. Appl. Agric. Trop. 33: 429 (1953).- Type: Adam 6614, Guinea (holo- P).
Regional litterature: FWTA: 479 (1972); Ghana grasses: 226 (1977); FTEA: 758 (1982); Gram. Cameroun: 455 (1992); Fl. Bénin: 239 (1992); Poac. CI: 520, fig. (1995); Fl. Guinée: 475 (2009).
Description:
* Small tufted annual, erect or ascending, up to 0.6 m. Culms slender. Leaves 2-8 cm long, 0.5-2 mm wide, flat to folded with a distinct broad midrib and slightly scabrid margins; base passing directly into sheath; ligule a short ciliolate membrane; sheath compressed, keeled, glabrous. Roots fine, wiry, usually dark or black.
* Inflorescence compound and scanty on the upper culms with numerous branches each bearing a short terminal raceme, subtended by a linear spatheole. Racemes single, 1-3 cm long; rhachis fragile; internodes linear or clavate with crateriform tip. Spikelets appressed. Pedicels linear or clavate, glabrous or bearing a few hairs.
* Sessile spikelets elliptic, dorsally compressed, 2.5-3(- 5) mm long; callus pilose; base obtuse. Lower glume elliptic, chartaceous, pilose, 2-keeled, narrowly winged near the apex; upper glume lanceolate. Lemmas hyaline, incised 2/3 of length; awn from sinus, geniculate, 20-25 mm long with twisted column; column black, glabrous. Pedicelled spikelets well-developed, lanceolate, dorsally compressed, 3-4 mm long; Glume with 1-3 mm long awn.
Distribution West Africa: Guinea, Mali, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Benin, Nigeria, Cameroon.
Distribution world-wide: Tanzania.