Seashore Dropseed

This is a common coastal grass growing along seashores in delta regions.

This species is a good sand binder. It is widespread on seashores and in inland, saline places in warm parts of both the Old and New Worlds.

A plant of sandy sea-shores; rarely on saline soils inland.

Culm genticulate at the basal nodes. Blades coriaceous, needle-like at the end, about 6 cm long by 1-1.5 mm wide; ligule about 0.2 mm long, upper margin and backside ciliate. Inflorescence a contracted panicle, about 8 cm long. Spikelets 1-flowered, about 2.5 mm long; glumes chartaceous; the lower about 1.2 mm long, lanceolate, irregularly toothed at the apex, nerveless; the upper lanceolate, 1-nerved, acute; lemma and palea the same texture with the glume; lemma ovate lanceolate, 1-nerved, boat-shaped, about 2 mm long; palea ovate 2-keeled, truncate at the apex. Fruit an utricle, about 1 mm long; embryo more than 1/2 the length of the utricle.

Perennial with long, tough, yellowish rhizomes. Culms erect or decumbent, often fastigiately branched in upper part, 15–30 cm tall, 1–2 mm thick. Leaf sheaths tightly overlapping, loosely pubescent at mouth; leaf blades glaucous, stiff, distichous, flat at first, soon involute, 3–10 × 0.1–0.3 cm, adaxial surface scabrid, abaxial surface smooth, apex pungent; ligule ca. 0.2 mm. Panicle linear, spikelike, 3–10 × 0.4–1 cm; branches 0.5–1.5 cm, erect, appressed to rachis. Spikelets gray-green or greenish yellow, fusiform, 2.3–2.7 mm; glumes acute; lower glume lanceolate, 2/3–4/5 spikelet length, 1-veined; upper glume narrowly ovate, as long as spikelet, 1-veined; lemma broadly lanceolate, subequal to upper glume, midvein distinct, lateral veins obscure, obtuse; palea equaling lemma. Anthers 3, 1–1.5 mm. Grain subglobose, ca. 0.7 mm. Fl. and fr. Jun–Sep. 2n = 18.

Perennial, spreading by long slender rhizomes; culms 10-30 cm high, 1-2 mm in diameter at the base. Leaf-blades nearly always convolute, 2-10 cm long, 1-4 mm wide, distichous, stiff, pungent. Panicle spike-like, linear, 2-10 cm long, (3-) 6-8(-l0) mm wide, untidily cylindrical, the branches closely appressed to the rhachis and 5-15 mm long. Spikelets 1.7-2.5 mm long; lower glume lanceolate, 1.2-2 mm long, two-thirds to four-fifths as long as the spikelet (variable even in the same panicle), acute; upper glume narrowly ovate-elliptic, as long as the spikelet, acute; lemma as long as the upper glume; anthers 3, 1-1.3 mm long. Grain subglobose, 0.7 mm long.

Distributed in tropical Asia, Africa and America.

Distribution: Pakistan (Sind); tropics and subtropics throughout the world.

Sandy seashores, often below high tide mark. Fujian, Guangdong, Hainan, Taiwan, Zhejiang [India, Indonesia, Japan (Ryukyu Islands), Malaysia, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam; tropics and subtropics].

Agrostis virginica Linnaeus, Sp. Pl. 1: 63. 1753; Vilfa virginica (Linnaeus) P. Beauvois.