湖北芨芨草 hu bei ji ji cao

Perennial, loosely tufted from a short knotty rhizome. Culms erect or slightly geniculate, 40–95 cm tall, 3–4-noded. Leaf sheaths ciliolate at abaxial junction with blade, shorter or lower longer than internodes; leaf blades linear, usually flat, 6–30 cm, 3–10 mm wide, abaxial surface smooth, adaxial surface and margins scaberulous, base narrowed, apex slenderly acuminate; ligule ca. 0.2 mm or absent. Panicle open to loosely contracted, 15–20 cm; branches 3–4 per node, capillary, 5–8 cm. Spikelets yellowish with green veins; glumes ovate-oblong, 3–4.5(–6) mm, hyaline, scabrid, 3-veined, veins prominent, distinct to apex, indistinct transverse veinlets present, apex apiculate or denticulate; callus thinly pilose; lemma elliptic-oblong, 2.5–3.5(–4) mm, subleathery, pallid, 3–5-veined, appressed pubescent, apex entire or emarginate; awn persistent, stout, flexuous, 0.8–1.2(–2) cm, very slightly twisted toward base. Anthers 1.5–2 mm, minutely bearded or glabrous at apex. Fl. Apr–Jun.

* Mountain slopes, forests, shady roadsides, moist places; 100–2500 m. Gansu, Guizhou, Henan, Hubei, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Yunnan.

The 3 prominent, green veins of the glumes are an obvious feature of the spikelet. They are linked above the middle by inconspicuous, transverse veinlets. The species has 3 lodicules (not 2, as given in the protologue), which sometimes have hairy tips.