Australian Tropical Rainforest Plants - Online edition

Oplismenus burmanni (Retz.) P.Beauv.


Grass
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Herbarium specimen. © DERM
Family

Palisot de Beauvois, A.M.F.J. (1812) Essai d'une Nouvelle Agrostographie 54: 170.

Stem

Annual with prostrate culms 10-60 cm long and rooting from the lower nodes. Nodes with silky hairs.

Leaves

Leaf-blades lanceolate to ovate, 10-90 x 5-20 mm; thinly textured, leaf-blade venation with obscure cross veins, base asymmetrical. Leaf-sheath prominently veined, with silky hairs on margin of sheath, 20-30 mm long. Ligule a ciliate membrane ca. 1.5 mm high.

Flowers

Inflorescence consists of a secund raceme of spikes each containing ca. 7 flowers or spikelets. Rachis triquetrous and with long silky hairs. Pedicels with long silky hairs. Glumes 3-veined. Outer glumes ca. 1.5 mm long, awn ca. 2 mm long (reddish). Outer glumes clothed in long silky hairs. Inner glumes 2-2.2 mm long. Awns 10-15 mm long and minutely scabrous. Lemna glabrous. Stigmas red, plumose.

Fruit

Caryopsis greenish cream coloured, very glossy and smooth, pointed at both ends.

Seedlings

Features not available.

Distribution and Ecology

Occurs in the NT, CYP and NEQ. Altitudinal range from near sea level to 1500 m. Grows in rainforest margins, monsoon forest, Melaleuca forest, vineforest, vine thicket and Corypha woodland. A shade-loving species. Also from Africa, Macaronesia, Caucasus and Arabia, India, Indo-China, Malesia, Pacific Islands, Mesoamericana, Caribbean, northern South America, western South America, and Brazil.

Synonyms
Panicum burmanni Retz., Observationes Botanicae 3: 10(1783), Type: Koenig s.n.; India: Madras (LD; IT: BM (4 sheets), C).
RFK Code
4119
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