Dichanthium sericeum subsp. sericeum
Silky Blue-grassTufted, usually strongly glaucous perennials, culms erect, sometimes branched near base, to c. 80 cm high, nodes fringed with spreading hairs to c. 3 mm long. Leaves glabrous (rarely with scattered hairs); blade to 15 cm long and 4 mm wide; ligule truncate, 1–2 mm long. Inflorescence with 2–6 racemes, each 1–6 cm long, digitately arranged, densely silky-hairy; pedicellate spikelets sterile (an empty lemma within the pair of glumes); sessile spikelets resembling pedicellate ones, c. 4 mm long (excluding awn), subtended by a tuft of silky hairs up to c. two-thirds as long as spikelet; lower glume, narrow-elliptic, 7–11-nerved, flattened dorsally, fringed with long hairs around the margin in the upper part; upper glume narrower, keeled, 3-nerved; sterile lemma about half as long as glumes, hyaline; fertile lemma inconspicuous, appearing as a slightly broader area toward the base of the brown, twice bent, twisting awn 2–3 cm long; palea absent. Flowers mainly Nov.–Apr.
MuM, Wim, VVP, VRiv, MuF, GipP, Gold, CVU, NIS, EGU, MonT. All States except Tas. Of restricted occurrence but locally common in drier grasslands and open woodlands; e.g. northern plains and rain-shadow areas between Bacchus Marsh and Melbourne and the upper Snowy River catchment in the east.
Most Victorian populations have entirely glabrous foliage, but a 1962 collection from near Kerang (growing amongst a plot of the introduced grass Chloris gayana) has leaves abundantly covered with fine, spreading hairs, a feature of some Queensland forms of the species. It is possible that the Kerang population resulted from seed inadvertently imported with the Chloris, perhaps from Queensland. It is not known if the hairy form has persisted in Victoria. All Victorian populations are referable to the typical subspecies, two other subspecies (both annuals) being confined to northern Australia.
Often co-extensive with the similar Bothriochloa macra from which it is readily distinguished by the hairy culm nodes.
Walsh, N.G. (1994). Poaceae. In: Walsh, N.G.; Entwisle, T.J., Flora of Victoria Vol. 2, Ferns and Allied Plants, Conifers and Monocotyledons, pp. 356–627. Inkata Press, Melbourne.
Spinning