Schizachyrium brevifolium (Sw.) Buse

This delicate annual is found in waste fields and on hillsides. As the species matures the leaves and sheaths turn a rosy red. It is rather rare in occurence.

This is a slender, weedy annual, occurring widely in warm parts of the world. The whole plant turns reddish brown at maturity. The delicate, branching habit, with very obtuse leaf blades, is distinctive.

Culm slender, 0.2-0.5 mm across, tufted. Blade linear, about 3 cm long by 2 mm wide; sheath compressed; ligule membranous, 0.6-0.8 mm long, fimbriate at the apex. Inflorescence a solitary raceme. Spikelets paired, dimorphlc, the upper pedicellate and much reduced, about 1 mm long, the lower about 3 mm long; rachis-joint glabrous. Glumes chartaceous, margins folded, lower glume lanceolate about 2.8 mm long; upper glume slightly fimbriate, 1-nerved, as long as the lower. Lower floret reduced. Upper floret membranous, slightly shorter than the glume, about 2.5 mm long; lemma deeply 2-cleft, with a flexuous awn arising from the sinus; palea linear-lanceolate, 2-keeled, margins fimbriate.

Annual. Culms delicate, erect or trailing, 10–70 cm long, copiously branched, glabrous. Leaves cauline; leaf sheaths keeled, glabrous; leaf blades yellowish green becoming reddish brown, oblong-linear, flat or folded, 1.5–4 × (0.1–)0.2–0.7 cm, glabrous, base subrounded, apex obtuse; ligule 0.5–0.8 mm, lacerate. Raceme slender, 1–2 cm, enclosed at base by spatheole, borne along most of culm length, usually several flexuous peduncles arising from each leaf axil; rachis internodes and pedicels inflated upward, ca. 3/4 length of sessile spikelet, glabrous to villous. Sessile spikelet 2.5–4 mm; lower glume linear-lanceolate, subleathery, back flat, glabrous to thinly pilose, indistinctly 4–5-veined, flanks keeled toward apex, keels wingless, apex minutely 2-toothed; upper lemma 2-lobed to near base; awn 0.7–1 cm. Pedicelled spikelet reduced to 1 or 2 glumes, up to 0.5 mm, lower glume with 3–5 mm awn. Fl. and fr. Jul–Dec.

India, tropics of Old World.

Widely distributed in the Old World.

Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Guizhou, Hainan, Hebei, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Shandong, Sichuan, Taiwan, Xizang, Zhejiang [Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam; Africa, America, SW Asia (Oman)].

700-1800 m

Open grassy banks, field margins, weedy places, sometimes gregarious; below 2000 m.

Andropogon brevifolius Sw., Prodr. Beg. Ind. Occ. 26. 1788.
Andropogon brevifolius Sw. var. paradosus (Buse) Ohwi, Act. Phytotax. Geobot 11: 169. 1942.

Andropogon brevifolius Swartz, Prodr. 26. 1788; Pollinia brevifolia (Swartz) Sprengel.

brevifolium: with short leaves

Schizachyrium brevifolium (Sw.) Nees; Miq. Fl. Ind
Bat. 3 : 495. 1855.
Andropogon brevifolius Sw. Prodr. 26. 1788.
Andropogon obtusifolius Poir. in I^am. Encyc. Suppl. 1 : 583. 1810. Pollinia vaginaia Spreng. Pugill. 2 : 11. 1815.
Pollinia hrevifoUa Spreng-. Pugill. 2 : 13. 1815.
Andropogon ienellus J. Presl, in Presl, Rel. Haenk. 1 : 335. 1830.
Andropogon Jloridus Trin. M^m. Acad. St. Petersb. VI. 2 : 265. 1832,
Andropogon debilis Kunth, Enuni. 1 : 488. 1833.
Sorgum brevifoHum Kuntze, Rev. Gen. 791. 1891.
A low spreading annual, with branching decumbent stems, and short obtuse leafblades. Stems up to 5 dm. long, slender, somewhat flattened, smooth and glabrous, finallyprostrate at the base ; leaf-sheaths compressed, the lower ones much shorter than the internodes ; blades linear, usually obtuse, often folded, glabrous, those on the main stem up to 5 cm. long and 5 mm. wide; spike-like racemes 1.5-3 cm. long, usually included at the base, the internodes of the rachis and the pedicels hispidulous on the angles; sessile spikelet 3.5-4 mm. long, the first scale lanceolate, acuminate, rough, hispidulous on the keels, the fourth scale cleft nearly to the base, the awn 8-15 mm. long, geniculate, the column spiral, from a little shorter than to one half the length of the subula ; pedicellate spikelet usually reduced to a single scale 1-1.5 mm. long and bearing an awn 4-5 mm. long.
Type locality : Jamaica.
Distribution : Tropical America ; also in tropical and subtropical regions elsewhere.

Annuals, Terrestrial, not aquatic, Stems trailing, spreading or prostrate, Stems nodes swollen or brittle, Stems terete, round in cross section, or polygonal, Stems branching above base or distally at nodes, Stem internodes solid or spongy, Stems with inflorescence less than 1 m tall, Stems, culms, or scapes exceeding basal leaves, Leaves mostly cauline, Leaves conspicuously 2-ranked, distichou s, Leaves sheathing at base, Leaf sheath mostly open, or loose, Leaf sheath smooth, glabrous, Leaf sheath and blade differentiated, Leaf blades linear, Leaf blades very narrow or filiform, less than 2 mm wide, Leaf blades 2-10 mm wide, Leaf blades mostly flat, Leaf blades mostly glabrous, Ligule present, Ligule a fringed, ciliate, or lobed membrane, Inflorescence terminal, Inflorescence lateral or axillary, Inflorescence with 2 or more spikes, fascicles, glomerules, heads, or clusters per culm, Inflorescence single raceme, fascicle or spike, Flowers bisexual, Spikelets pedicellate, Spikelets sessile or subsessile, Spikelets laterally compressed, Inflorescence or spikelets partially hidden in leaf sheaths, subtended by spatheole, Spikelet less than 3 mm wide, Spikelets with 1 fertile floret, Spikelets with 2 florets, Spikelets paired at rachis nodes, Spikelets in paired units, 1 sessile, 1 pedicellate, Pedicellate spikelet rudimentary or absent, usually sterile, Spikelets bi sexual, Spikelets disarticulating below the glumes, Spikelets falling with parts of disarticulating rachis or pedicel, Rachilla or pedicel glabrous, Glumes present, empty bracts, Glumes 2 clearly present, Glumes equal or subequal, Glumes equal to or longer than adjacent lemma, Glume equal to or longer than spikelet, Glumes keeled or winged, Lemmas thin, chartaceous, hyaline, cartilaginous, or membranous, Lemma 1 nerved, Lemma glabrous, Lemma apex dentate, 2-fid, Lemma mucronate, very shortly beaked or awned, less than 1-2 mm, Lemma with 1 awn, Lemma awn less than 1 cm long, Lemma awn from sinus of bifid apex, Lemma awn twisted, spirally coiled at base, like a corkscrew, Lemma awn once geniculate, bent once, Lemma margins thin, lying flat, Lemma straight, Callus or base of lemma evidently hairy, Callus hairs shorter than lemma, Stamens 3, Styles 2-fid, deeply 2-branched, Stigmas 2, Fruit - caryopsis.