Flora of New Zealand Series

Annuals or biennials, 12-50 cm, loosely tufted or consisting of a solitary culm. Leaf-sheath villous, with soft spreading hairs; upper sheaths with shorter, ± appressed hairs. Ligule 0.5-1 mm, denticulate. Leaf-blade 3-10 cm × 1.5-2.5 mm, pubescent; margins scabrid near acute tip. Culm 8-30 cm, erect, internodes pubescent. Panicle 4-6.5 cm, erect to later sometimes nodding, usually ± contracted; branches scabrid, some > spikelets. Spikelets 1.5-2 cm, 5-10-flowered, ovate- to elliptic-lanceolate, pale green. Glumes unequal, acute, firmly membranous to chartaceous, smooth, but scabrid on keel; lower 5-6.5 mm, 3-(5)-nerved, oblong-lanceolate, upper 6-8 mm, 5-7-nerved, ovate to elliptic. Lemma 7.5-9 mm, rather obscurely 7-9-nerved, rounded, firmly chartaceous, elliptic to ± obovate, very minutely scabrid especially in upper ½; margins flat, overlapping; apex very slightly emarginate; awn from just below apex, straight, 6-8 mm. Palea slightly < lemma, keels sparsely long-ciliate, flanks glabrous. Callus glabrous. Rachilla c. 1 mm, minutely scabrid. Anthers 1-1.5-(2) mm. Caryopsis not seen.

N.: Auckland City, South Auckland (Pukeatua, near Rotorua), near Wellington; S.: Canterbury (Cheviot), southern Westland (Gillespies Beach). Sand dunes and river mouths and in waste land.

Naturalised from Europe.