Chloris barbata, Sw.
This is a very common perennial grass.
Stems are stout, tufted, geniculately ascending and erect when in flower, and some creeping and rooting at the nodes; leafy at the base and branching upwards, 1 to 3 feet; the lower internodes are 2 to 3 inches long and the upper still longer, glabrous.
The leaf-sheaths are glabrous, compressed laterally, open at the base and closed above, with a few scattered long hairs at the mouth, the margins thinly membranous. The ligule is a very narrow membrane. The nodes are glabrous mostly bearing tufts of leaves with compressed equitant sheaths.
The leaf-blade is narrow linear, flat or folded, acuminate, with long hairs on the margin towards the base, varying in length from 2 to 18 inches.
Fig. 201.—Chloris barbata.
1 to 5. the first, second, third, fourth and the fifth glume of a spikelet; 3a and 3b. the third glume and its palea; 3c. ovary, stamens and lodicules; 4a and 5a. the fourth and fifth glumes; 6. grain.
The inflorescence consists of five to fourteen or fifteen sessile, digitately arranged spikes, varying in length from 1-1/2 to 3 inches, on a slender peduncle; the rachis is slender minutely hairy swollen at the base.