PENNISETUM thunbergii [family POACEAE], auct. non Kunth.
Information
Reed-like perennial from a creeping rhizome; stems up to 1 m high; leaves often inrolled, hard, glaucous; ligule a line of hairs. Panicle linear, 6–20 cm long; rhachis cylindrical with rounded ribs, with or without peduncle-stumps, scaberulous or pubescent; involucre enclosing 1 sessile spikelet, with or without a stipe at the base; bristles glabrous, the longest 5–20 mm. Spikelets narrowly elliptic to narrowly ovate, 2–6 mm long; lower glume up to 1/4 the length of the spikelet; upper glume 1/8–1/4(–1/2) the length of the spikelet, acute to acuminate, sometimes obtuse; lower lemma male or barren, 3/4 as long to as long as the spikelet, acute to cuspidate; upper lemma similar to the lower.
Range
N2 tropical and South Africa, mainly in the east
Altitude range
c. 1500 m.
Distribution
SOMALIA Newbould 907.
Distribution (external)
Arabia
Notes
Just one of a cluster of intergrading species from tropical Africa that inhabit watersides and mires, and the determination of the single known Somali specimen as P. macrourum is admittedly somewhat arbitrary; the specimen was misnamed P. thunbergii in Cope (1985).
