地毯草 di tan cao

Milium compressum Swartz, Prodr. 24. 1788; Paspalum compressum (Swartz) Raspail (1825), not Rafinesque (1817); P. guadaloupense Steudel.

Perennial with vigorous creeping stolons, forming sward. Culms 15–60 cm tall, nodes bearded. Leaf sheaths loose, strongly compressed, keeled, basal sheaths imbricate; leaf blades broadly linear to lanceolate, flat or folded, 5–20 × 0.6–1.2 cm, glabrous or adaxial surface pilose, apex obtuse; ligule 0.3–0.5 mm. Racemes 2–5, digitate or subdigitate, 4–10 cm, only slightly diverging; rachis glabrous. Spikelets oblong-lanceolate, 2–2.7 mm, pilose or glabrous, apex acute; upper glume and lower lemma 2–4-veined, midvein absent, laterals marginal; upper lemma pale, oblong-elliptic, shorter than spikelet, obtuse with an apical tuft of hairs; stigmas pale. Fl. and fr. summer–autumn. 2n = 40, 50, 60, 80.

Roadsides, weedy places on moist ground, naturalized. Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hainan, Taiwan, Yunnan [native to tropical America; widely introduced elsewhere].

This is a good lawn and fodder grass.