Description: Erect, slender, tufted annuals or perennials.
Leaves with ligule a short, ciliate rim; blade bristle-like, involute.
Inflorescence a dense spike-like green or purplish panicle.
Spikelets solitary, shortly pedicellate, laterally compressed, bisexual florets 3–9; rachilla disarticulating above the glumes and between the lemmas. Glumes thin, unequal, narrow, 1-nerved, keeled, the upper glume 2 toothed. Lemmas longer than the glumes, 3-lobed, 3-nerved, the nerves (especially the lateral) ciliate, awned from the central nerve, 2 other awns arising from the lateral margins; awns fine, rough, longer than the lemmas; callus short, bearded. Palea shorter than the lemma, membranous, 2-nerved.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 6–10 species, mostly from Africa, New Guinea & Australia. Australia: 1 species (native).
Derivation: from the Greek words for ‘three’ and ‘needle’.
Text by Jacobs, S.W.L., Whalley, R.D.B. & Wheeler, D.J.B.
Taxon concept: Grasses of New South Wales, Fourth Edition (2008).
| One species in NSW: Triraphis mollis |
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