A. Camus
[Andropogon sericeus R. Br.]
(nat) Australian bluestem
Glaucous, cespitose perennials; culms erect or somewhat decumbent at base, 50- 100 cm tall, silky pilose at nodes, otherwise glabrous. Sheaths 7-15 cm long, shorter than the internodes, striate, glabrous except toward the collar; ligule membranous, 2-3 mm long, lacerate; blades 15-45 cm long, 2-6 mm wide, scaberulous and usually with a sparse tuft of long hairs at base, midrib conspicuous, apex attenuate. Inflorescences consisting of 2-5 racemes, digitately arranged, each one 3-6 cm long, peduncles slender, rachis silky pilose; sessile spikelet elliptic-oblong, first glume coriaceous, ob- long-ovate, 3.5-4 mm long, 9-nerved, appressed pubescent on lower Wwith papillose-pilose hairs 2-3 mm long on margins of upper part and in a line across the top slightly below apex, apex obtuse or minutely bifid, second glume as long as first glume, subcoriaceous, with 3 converging nerves, keeled, glabrous or with a few long hairs at apex, margins ciliate, involute, apex truncate, erose, first lemma broadly ovate to lanceolate, ca. 2h as long as the glumes, hyaline, apex acute, second lemma 2.5-3 mm long, less than 0.2 mm wide, prolonged into a reddish brown, twisted, geniculate awn 2.5 cm long; pedicellate spikelet sterile, pedicel ca. 2 mm long, first glume subcoriaceous, cuneate, ca. 3 mm long, 9-nerved, with short appressed hairs at base and silky pubescent on margins and at apex, obtuse, second glume membranous, narrow, ca. 2.5 mm long, pilose on margins and at apex, truncate; palea absent. Caryopsis obovoid, ca. 2 mm long. [2n = 10, 20.] Native to Australia; in Hawaii naturalized usually in dry sites such as pastures, grasslands, and open shrubland, 10-820 m, on all of the main islands except Kaua'i and Moloka‘i. First collected on Lana‘i in 1914 (Munro 404, BISH).