Fig. 95.—Panicum ramosum.
Panicum ramosum, L.
This is an annual with stems erect or ascending from a creeping base, rooting at the lower nodes, 1 to 2 feet long. The stem is slender or stout, usually glabrous though occasionally glabrescent or pubescent, channelled on one side, branched from base upwards, and leafy.
The leaf-sheath is finely striate, keeled, thinly pubescent with the margins ciliate near the ligule. The ligule is only a fringe of short hairs. Nodes are softly hairy.
The leaf-blade is flat, linear-lanceolate, acuminate, softly pubescent or glabrescent on both the surfaces, with rounded or subcordate base and margins minutely serrate and ciliate, 2 to 6 inches long 1/6 to 1/2 inch broad; the midrib is distinct though slender with four to six main veins on each side.
The inflorescence is a pyramidal panicle 2 to 6 inches long, consisting of usually five to ten (rarely also up to twenty) erect or spreading spikes. Spikes are distant, alternate and in some the lower ones are opposite, 1/2 to 2-1/2 inches long or shorter. The rachis of the spike is thin, angular and scaberulous.