3. Ischaemum aristatum Linnaeus, Sp. Pl. 2: 1049. 1753.
有芒鸭嘴草 you mang ya zui cao
Perennial. Culms loosely tufted, erect or geniculately ascending, 40–80 cm tall, simple or branching, nodes glabrous. Leaf sheaths glabrous or pilose; leaf blades linear-lanceolate, 5–25 × 0.4–1 cm, glabrous or thinly pilose, margins smooth becoming scabrid toward apex, base attenuate or contracted, apex acuminate; ligule 2–3 mm. Racemes terminal, paired, appressed back to back, 4–7 cm; rachis internodes clavate, triquetrous, scabrid or ciliate along outer angle, inner angles glabrous or shortly ciliate. Sessile spikelet oblanceolate to obovate, 5.5–8 × 2–2.3 mm; lower glume leathery with rounded flanks below middle, herbaceous, broader and 2-keeled above, 5–7-veined, keels narrowly to broadly winged, wing margin scabrid; upper lemma awnless or shortly awned; awn well developed or imperfect, up to 1.2 cm. Pedicelled spikelet dorsally compressed, resembling sessile, asymmetrical, 2-keeled, keels winged, one wing incurled. Fl. and fr. Jul–Oct. 2n = 56, 72.
Open grassy sandy places, often near the sea; 100–1000 m. S Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hainan, Hebei, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Liaoning, Shandong, Taiwan, NE Yunnan, Zhejiang [Japan, Korea, Vietnam].
This species usually has awnless or only inconspicuously awned racemes, but occasionally the awns are a little longer and more obvious. Longer awns are weakly associated with a more broadly winged sessile spikelet, and the type of the species name falls within this less frequent variant.