Digitaria ciliaris var. ciliaris

Annual herb 10 cm - 1 m tall Leaves: alternate, two-ranked. Sheaths open, with bumpy-based hairs. Ligules 2 - 3.5 mm long, membranous. Blades 1.5 - 18 cm long, 3 - 9 mm wide, flat, parallel-veined, rough. Inflorescence: a terminal, palmate or whorled arrangement of spikelet branches (panicle). Branches two to ten, 3 - 24 cm long, 0.5 - 2 mm wide, spike-like, sometimes with hairs under 1 mm long, marginally winged along the axis. Lowest nodes bearing hairs over 0.4 mm long. Fruit: a caryopsis, indehiscent, enclosed within the persistent lemma and palea, flat on one side and convex on the other (plano-convex). Culm: decumbent and upright, unbranched or sparingly branched, 10 cm - 1 m long (upright portion 30 cm - 0.6 m long), round in cross-section, rooting and branching at the nodes. Nodes two to five. Spikelets: 2.5 - 4 mm long. Florets: two per spikelet. Lower florets sterile. Upper florets bisexual. Anthers three, 0.5 - 1 mm long. Stigmas red. Glumes:: Lower glumes about 0.5 mm long, pointed at the apex. Upper glumes 1.5 - 2.5 mm long, two-thirds to nearly as long as spikelet, three-veined, softly hairy at the apex and along the margins. Lemmas:: Lower lemmas 2.5 - 4 mm long, equal to upper lemmas, seven-veined (unequally spaced), membranous, bearing hairs. Upper lemmas brown, often tinged purple, 2.5 - 4 mm long, obscurely veined, with margins that embrace the upper paleas. Paleas:: Lower paleas absent. Upper paleas similar in size and texture to upper lemmas.

Similar species: No information at this time.

Habitat and ecology: Rare in the Chicago Region, and known only from Porter and Starke counties in Indiana. There it grew in sandy areas.

Occurence in the Chicago region: native

Etymology: Digitaria comes from the Latin word digitus, meaning finger, referring to the digitate inflorescence of some species. Ciliaris means "with marginal hairs."

Author: The Morton Arboretum