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Descriptions

W.D. Clayton, M. Vorontsova, K.T. Harman & H. Williamson

© Copyright The Board of Trustees, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Aegilops crassa

HABIT Annual; caespitose; clumped loosely. Culms erect, or geniculately ascending; 30–50 cm long. Leaf-sheath oral hairs ciliate. Leaf-sheath auricles falcate. Ligule an eciliate membrane. Leaf-blades 10–20 cm long; 4–10 mm wide. Leaf-blade surface glabrous, or pilose; hairy on both sides; with tubercle-based hairs. Leaf-blade margins scabrous.

INFLORESCENCE Inflorescence composed of racemes.

Racemes 1; single; moniliform; smoothly terete; bilateral; 4–8 cm long; bearing 6–8 fertile spikelets on each. Rhachis fragile at the nodes; semiterete. Spikelet packing broadside to rhachis.

Spikelets appressed; solitary. Fertile spikelets sessile.

STERILE SPIKELETS Basal sterile spikelets absent, or rudimentary; 0–2 in number.

FERTILE SPIKELETS Spikelets comprising 3–5 fertile florets; with diminished florets at the apex. Spikelets ovate; laterally compressed; 10–14 mm long; falling entire; deciduous with accessory branch structures.

GLUMES Glumes similar; shorter than spikelet. Lower glume oblong; asymmetrical; 8–10 mm long; 1 length of upper glume; coriaceous; without keels; 7–9 -veined. Lower glume lateral veins unequally thickened; ribbed. Lower glume surface pubescent. Lower glume apex dentate; 2–4 -fid; truncate. Upper glume oblong; asymmetrical; 8–10 mm long; 0.9 length of adjacent fertile lemma; coriaceous; without keels; 7–9 -veined. Upper glume lateral veins unequally thickened; ribbed; parallel at apex. Upper glume surface pubescent. Upper glume apex dentate; 2–4 -fid; truncate.

FLORETS Fertile lemma oblong; 10–12 mm long; coriaceous; keeled; 5 -veined. Lemma apex entire, or dentate; 2 -fid; with irregular lobes; truncate; muticous, or awned; 1 -awned. Principal lemma awn flat below; 50–80 mm long overall (becoming longer above, but shorter than raceme). Palea 2 -veined. Palea keels scabrous. Apical sterile florets resembling fertile though underdeveloped.

FLOWER Lodicules 2; ciliate. Ovary with a fleshy appendage below style insertion; pubescent on apex.

FRUIT Caryopsis with adherent pericarp; hairy at apex. Disseminule comprising a rhachis internode.

DISTRIBUTION Asia-temperate: Soviet Middle Asia, Caucasus, and western Asia.

NOTES Triticeae. Fl Iran.

Please cite this publication as detailed in How to Cite Version: 3rd February 2016.