Guadua Velutina

HABIT:

• Perennial; caespitose.
• Rhizomes short; pachymorph.
• Culms erect; 300–500 cm long; 50–100 mm diam.; woody.
• Culm-internodes terete; thick-walled; mid-green; distally glabrous.
• Lateral branches dendroid.
• Culm-sheaths hispid; auriculate; with 10–40 mm high auricles; setose on shoulders; shoulders with 5–10 mm long hairs.
• Culm-sheath blade lanceolate; 11–17 cm long; pubescent.
• Leaf-sheaths pubescent.
• Leaf-sheath oral hairs setose; 5–10 mm long.
• Leaf-sheath auricles absent.
• Ligule an eciliate membrane; 0.3–0.5 mm long.
• Collar with external ligule.
• Leaf-blade base with a brief petiole-like connection to sheath.
• Leaf-blades linear, or lanceolate; 10–20 cm long; 11–22 mm wide.
• Leaf-blade surface glabrous.
• 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 4–8 fertile florets; with diminished florets at the apex.
• Spikelets linear; laterally compressed; 50–70 mm long; 3–5 mm wide; breaking up at maturity; disarticulating below each fertile floret.

 

GLUMES:

• Glumes several; 4–7 empty glumes; persistent; shorter than spikelet.
• Upper glume ovate; 4–15 mm long.

 

FLORETS:

• Fertile lemma ovate; 12–15 mm long; coriaceous; without keel; 25–30 -veined.
• Lemma surface pubescent.
• Lemma apex apiculate.
• Palea 8–13 mm long.
• Palea keels winged; conspicuously winged; ciliate.
• Apical sterile florets resembling fertile though underdeveloped.

 

FLOWER:

• Lodicules 3.
• Anthers 6; 5–9 mm long.
• Stigmas 3.
• Ovary umbonate.

 

FRUIT:

• Caryopsis with adherent pericarp.

 

DISTRIBUTION:

• Mexico

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