Guadua Longifolia

HABIT:

• Perennial; caespitose.
• Rhizomes short; pachymorph.
• Culms erect; 400–1000 cm long; 20–50 mm diam.; woody.
• Culm-internodes terete; thick-walled, or solid; mid-green; distally glabrous, or pilose; with tubercle-based hairs.
• Lateral branches dendroid.
• Culm-sheaths glabrous, or pubescent; with white hairs; without auricles; glabrous on shoulders.
• Culm-sheath blade lanceolate; 2–9 cm long; pubescent.
• Leaf-sheaths glabrous on surface, or hispid; outer margin hairy.
• Leaf-sheath oral hairs setose; 2–7 mm long.
• Leaf-sheath auricles absent.
• Ligule an eciliate membrane; 0.1–0.2 mm long.
• Collar with external ligule.
• Leaf-blade base with a brief petiole-like connection to sheath.
• Leaf-blades linear; 13–27 cm long; 4–7 mm wide.
• Leaf-blade surface glabrous; hairless except near base.
• Leaf-blade apex acuminate.

 

INFLORESCENCE:

• Synflorescence bractiferous; clustered at the nodes; in untidy tufts; lax; with glumaceous subtending bracts; prophyllate below lateral spikelets; leafy between clusters.

 

FERTILE SPIKELETS:

• Spikelets comprising 5–8 fertile florets; with diminished florets at the apex.
• Spikelets linear; laterally compressed; 50–130 mm long; 3–4 mm wide; breaking up at maturity; disarticulating below each fertile floret.

 

GLUMES:

• Glumes several; 3–8 empty glumes; persistent; shorter than spikelet.
• Upper glume ovate; 3–14 mm long.

 

FLORETS:

• Fertile lemma ovate; 15–21 mm long; coriaceous; without keel; 17–23 -veined.
• Lemma surface glabrous.
• Lemma apex mucronate; 1 -awned.
• Principal lemma awn 3–5 mm long overall.
• Palea 10–15 mm long.
• Palea keels winged; conspicuously winged; ciliate.
• Apical sterile florets resembling fertile though underdeveloped.

 

FLOWER:

• Lodicules 3.
• Anthers 3; 7–8.5 mm long.
• Stigmas 3.
• Ovary umbonate.

 

FRUIT:

• Caryopsis with adherent pericarp.

 

DISTRIBUTION:

• Belize
• Guatemala
• Mexico

Sources:
GrassBase - The Online World Grass Flora
INBAR (International Network for Bamboo and Rattan)