Common name: One-spiked Paspalum
Paspalum ciliatifolium Michx. APNI*
Description: Slender perennial to c. 1 m high in fairly open tufts.
Leaves with sheath glabrous or pubescent along the margins, hairy at the orifice; ligule c. 1 mm long with an auricle 0.5–1 mm long on 1 or both margins; blade to 2 cm wide, typically strongly ciliate with tubercle-based hairs along minutely undulate cartilaginous margins, sometimes only ciliate towards the base, rarely glabrous.
Inflorescence of 1–4, slender, arching racemes 3–10 cm long, with a tuft of hairs at the base. Spikelets paired, in 2 rows, 1.9–2.1 mm long. Lower glume sometimes present as a small flap or minute rim; upper glume and sterile lemma similar, 3-nerved, or the midnerve of the sterile lemma suppressed. Fertile lemma the same size as the spikelet, smooth.
Flowering: summer.
Distribution and occurrence: North from Macksville on the North Coast. Presumably introduced as a pasture species; of doubtful value, now naturalised on sandy soils.
NSW subdivisions: *NC
Text by S. W. L. Jacobs, Whalley, R.D.B. & Wheeler, D.J.B. Taxon concept: Grasses of New South Wales, Fourth Edition (2008).
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