Compilation
Pennisetum purpurascens

perennial; culms from a rather slender rhizome, ascending, conspicuously geniculate, slender, compressed below, 3/4–1 1/2 ft. long, about 2-noded, smooth, glabrous or pubescent below the panicle; upper internodes exserted, uppermost often long; leaves for the most part crowded at the base, glabrous except a hairy line at the junction of blade and sheath, rarely hairy all over except towards the base of the sheaths; sheaths firm, lower short, persistent, striate, keeled or ultimately rounded, upper long, loose or subtumid; ligule a dense silky fringe of short hairs; blades linear, tapering to an acute point, 2–3 in. (rarely more) by 2–3 lin., keeled and folded or flat or involute, rigid, rather dull green, smooth except towards the tips and along the scaberulous margins; panicle cylindric, very dense, erect, 1 1/4–2 in. by 3–5 lin., purplish; rhachis scabrid; pedicels obsolete; involucres of very numerous and very fine scaberulous bristles, purplish above, of unequal length, the longer sometimes twice as long as the spikelets; spikelets solitary, oblong-lanceolate, 1 1/2–2 lin. long, pallid, glabrous; lower glume suppressed, upper very minute, hyaline, nerveless; lower floret reduced to an ovate acuminate 1–3-nerved valve of about half the length of the hermaphrodite floret and usually with a short fine bristle; fertile valve ovate-oblong, abruptly mucronate, acuminate, 5- to sub-7-nerved; lodicules 0 or very minute; anthers about 1 lin. long, tips minutely bearded; styles almost free, although often more or less cohering. null