棒头草 bang tou cao

Nowodworskya fugax (Nees ex Steudel) Nevski; Poly-pogon demissus Steudel; P. higegaweri Steudel; P. littoralis var. higegaweri (Steudel) J. D. Hooker.

Annual, tufted. Culms geniculate, sometimes trailing and rooting at lower nodes, 10–75 cm tall. Leaf blades linear or broadly linear, 2.5–15 cm, 3–10 mm wide, scabrid or adaxial surface smooth, apex acute; ligule 3–8 mm. Panicle densely cylindrical, slightly lobed, or looser and narrowly ovate, 4–15 cm, pale green or flushed purple; branches narrowly ascending, up to 4 cm, bearing densely clustered spikelets. Spikelets narrowly oblong, 2–2.5 mm; glumes narrowly oblong, puberulous, vein scabrid-aculeate, margins shortly ciliate in lower half, apex emarginate, awned from sinus; awn shorter than or up to 1.5 times as long as glume body; lemma elliptic, 1–1.2 mm, apex slightly 4-toothed, midvein extended into a fine, straight, ca. 2 mm awn; palea as long as lemma. Stamens 3, anthers ca. 0.7 mm. Caryopsis elliptic, ca. 1 mm. Fl. and fr. Apr–Sep.

Moist places, near farmlands; 100–3600 m. Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Henan, Hubei, Jiangsu, Shaanxi, Shandong, Shanxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Xinjiang, Xizang, Yunnan, Zhejiang [Bhutan, N India, Japan, Kazakhstan, Korea, Kyrgyzstan, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan; SW Asia; introduced elsewhere].

The names Polypogon littoralis Smith and P. lutosus (Poiret) Hitchcock have both been misapplied to this species. They are in fact synonyms of ×Agropogon lutosus.