Sehima nervosum (Rottler) Stapf

Considered to be an excellent fodder grass.

Perennial. Culms erect, wiry, 30–100 cm tall, nodes bearded or glabrous. Leaf sheaths glabrous or hispid with tubercle-based hairs; leaf blades linear, flat, tough, pale green, 10–45 × 0.2–0.7 cm, scabrid, tapering to a filiform apex; ligule 2–3 mm. Raceme 3–12(–18) cm, straight or gently curved; rachis internodes and pedicels stoutly linear, 3.5–5 mm. Sessile spikelet yellowish green, 7–9 mm; lower glume narrowly oblong, deeply grooved between keels in lower part, with 6 prominent laterally placed intercarinal veins, inner veins anastomosing toward apex, apex scarious, 1/4–1/3 glume length, shortly 2-toothed; upper glume with straight, 7–13 mm awn; awn of upper lemma stout, 1.7–3.5 cm, column brown, ciliolate along spiral, limb pallid. Pedicelled spikelet usually flushed purple, 7–10 mm, lower glume conspicuously 7-veined, margins ciliate. Fl. and fr. Jul–Oct.

Tufted perennial; culms 30-100 cm high, wiry. Leaf-blades flat, 5-40. cm long wide, glaucous, long acuminate to a filiform tip. Raceme 3-12 gently curved. Sessile spikelet 6-10 mm long, laterally compressed; lower glume narrowly oblong-elliptic, thinly coriaceous with a membranous tip up to a quarto its length, 2 keeled, concave between the keels, lyrately nerved with 2-3 closely spaced nerves adjacent to each keel; upper lemma with an awn 2-4 cm long, minutely ciliolate along the spiral. Pedicelled spikelet lanceolate, 6-10 mm long, purplish, ciliate; lower glume with a mid-nerve and 2-3 conspicuous lateral nerves adjacent to each keel.

Distribution: Pakistan (N.W.F.P.); tropical Africa and Arabia, extending through India to China, and southwards to Australia.

Dry grasslands; at low elevations. Hainan, Yunnan [India, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, New Guinea, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam; E Africa, SW Asia, Australia].

Andropogon nervosus Rottler, Ges. Naturf. Freunde Berlin Neue Schriften 4: 218. 1803 ["nervosum"]; Ischaemum laxum R. Brown; I. nervosum (Rottler) Thwaites.