Panicum pilosum Sw.

Panicum milleflorum Hitchc. & Chase, Contr. U. S. Nat
Herb. 17: 494. 1915.
Plants perennial ; culms ascending or erect from an elongate creeping base, rooting at the nodes, glabrous, 0.8-2 meters high, 4-5 mm. thick, compressed, the nodes pubescent or glabrous, usually with one to several long erect panicle-bearing branches ; leaf -sheaths about as
long as the internodes, keeled toward the summit, ciliate on the margin and puberulent at the juncture with the blade, otherwise glabrous or sparsely papillose-hispid; ligule wanting, the ligular region puberulent; blades flat, 20-40 cm. long, 1-2 cm. wide, rarely wider, long-acuminate, somewhat narrowed to the subcordate base, glabrous or very sparsely hirsute, the margin scabrous; panicles 20-35 cm. long, about 6 cm. wide, in outline tapering to both ends, consisting of numerous ascending or spreading, often curving slender spike-like branches solitary or in fascicles along an elongate glabrous axis, the lower distant, the upper approximate, the scabrous angled often sparsely pilose rachises bearing throughout their length along their lower side evenly disposed short approximate densely flowered branchlets, those of the lower branches sometimes as much as 15 mm. long, the others 1-2 mm. long; spikelets subsessile, 1.3 mm. long, about 0.5 mm. wide, glabrous, the first glume about one third the length of the spikelet, the second glume and sterile lemma equal, the lemma inflated boat-shaped with a large membranaceous palea; fruit 1.2 mm. long, 0.4 mm. wide, acute, the lemma boat-shaped.
Type locality: Frijoles, Canal Zone. Distribution: Panama to Trinidad.

Panicum pilosum Sw. Prodr. 22. 1788
Panicum distichum Lam. Encyc. 4: 731. 1797.
Panicum pilisparsum G. Meyer, Fl. Esseq. 57. 1818.
Panicum trichophorum Schrad.; Schultes, in R. & S. Syst. Veg. Mant. 2: 247. 1824.
Setaria disticha Humb.; Spreng. Syst. 1: 305. 1825.
Panicum distans Willd.; Spreng. Syst. 1: 305, as synonym. 1825.
Panicum densiflorum Willd.; Spreng. Syst. 1: 320. 1825.
Setaria pilosa Ktinth, Rev. Gram. 47. 1829.
Setaria Meyeri Kunth, Rev. Gram. 47. 1829.
Setaria Schraderi Kunth, Rev. Gram. 47. 1829.
Panicum apiculatum Salzm.; Steud. Syn. Gram. 65, as synonym. 1854.
Plants perennial, usually decumbent or creeping at base, rooting at the nodes and sending up erect branches, smaller plants sometimes erect; culms usually branching, 25-100 cm. high, the nodes villous or sometimes glabrous or nearly so; leaf -sheaths elongate, but usually less so than the internodes, keeled, separating more or less from the culm, exposing the long prophyllum, and inrolled at the summit, somewhat simulating a petiole to the blade, glabrous or sometimes ciliate or sparsely hirsute; llgules wanting; blades ascending or spreading, narrowly lanceolate, 4—20 cm. long, 7-15 mm. wide, broadest near the cordate or truncate base, puberulent at the very base, otherwise glabrous or sometimes sparsely pubescent; panicles consisting of 10-40 spike-like, densely flowered, somewhat spreading racemes along an axis 5-15 cm. long, the lower distant; racemes 1-3 cm. long, straight or curved, bearing numerous spikelets in clusters of 1-3 secund on the lower side, the rachises copiously to sparsely papillose-hispid, the hairs 1-3 mm. long, wanting in occasional specimens; spikelets about 1.5 mm. long, 0.6 mm. wide, and nearly 1 mm. thick; first glume about half the length of the spikelet; second glume and sterile lemma equal, the former 5-, the latter 3-nerved, both scabrous on the midnerve at the apex, the sterile palea as long as its lemma, becoming subrigid and forcing open the spikelet; fruit 1.3 mm. long, 0.6 mm. wide.
Type locality: Jamaica.
Distribution: Mexico and the West Indies to Paraguay.