FTA 9: 309 (1919).- Type: Newton s.n., Angola (iso- K).
Andropogon poecilotrichus Hack. in Boll. Soc. Brot. 3: 135 (1885).
Regional litterature: FWTA: 492 (1972); Ghana grasses: 164 (1977); FTEA: 796 (1982); Fl. Rwanda: 293, fig (1988); Gram. Cameroun: 476 (1992); Fl. Ethiopia & Eritrea 7: 338, fig (1995); Fl. Guinée: 462 (2009); Pl. Sudan & S Sudan: 134 (2015).
Description:
* Erect perennial bunchgrass of 0.5-1.5 m high. Leaves long linear, 15-30 cm long, 1.5-3 mm broad, shortly hairy with a recessed white midrib and scabrid margins tending to roll outwards; base narrowed, passing straight into the sheath; ligule a glabrous pink membrane of 1.5 mm; sheaths slightly compressed and keeled, the basal ones glabrous, upper ones sometimes hairy towards the apex.
* Inflorescence a fasciculated panicle, contracted or open, 20-30 cm long, composed of paired, often not or late reflexed racemes. Spatheoles linear, 4-8 cm long; peduncle 4-8 cm long, glabrous or pilose above. Racemes 1.5-2 cm long; rachis fragile, ciliate on margins, hairs white, internodes linear; raceme-bases unequal, glabrous, filiform, the longer 3.5-7 mm long; 4-7 awns per pair of racemes. At the base of the lower raceme one (rarely two) pair and on the upper two (sometimes one) pairs of homogamous spikelets.
* Sessile spikelet lanceolate, 5.5-6.5 mm long; callus dark, cuneate, 1-2 mm long, pubescent, base acute or pungent. Lower glume lanceolate, pubescent, yellow to dark brown. Upper lemma linear with a geniculate awn with twisted rufous pubescent column of 2.5-4.5 cm long from the sinus. Pedicelled spikelets lanceolate, 4-7 mm long; glume awned with 0.5-2 mm long awn; homogamous spikelets similar but without an awn.
Distribution West Africa: Guinea, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon, CAR, Sudan, South Sudan.
Distribution world-wide: Congo, DRC, Ethiopia, Uganda, C, E and southern Africa.