Melica onoei Franch. & Sav.

This species is mainly distributed from Japan to Yunnan, but a few gatherings are known from the W Himalayas. The combination of broad leaf blades, short ligule, narrow, green spikelets and smooth palea keels distinguishes it from other Chinese Melica species with a large, open panicle.

Melica onoei var. pilosula Papp (Acad. Romana, Mem. Sect. Sti., ser. 3, 12: 242. 1937) was described as having a simple, contracted panicle, smooth leaf sheaths, a long pilose adaxial leaf surface, and a pointed, ca. 5 mm ligule. The panicle and ligule definitely exclude it from M. onoei. It is based on a specimen from Beijing that has not been seen.

Melica onoei is very similar to Melica scaberrima, differing mainly by the smaller dimensions of the parts of the spikelet, the frequently narrower panicle and the broader leaves.

Aphyllopodic perennial. Culms few together, erect, up to 100 cm tall, lower part leafless, clothed with old leaf sheaths, 2 mm in diameter. Blades 15-25 cm long, 5-10 mm wide, flat, stif; ligule chartaceous, 0.5 mm long, truncated. Panicle open, 15-25 cm long; branches 2-3-nate. Spikelets on a slender, curved pedicel, 3-5-flowered including the upper rudiment, 6-8 mm long; glumes membranous; the lower lanceolate, 3 mm long, 1-nerved, the upper broadly lanceolate, 4-5 mm long, with a long midnerve and 2 or 4 lateral nerves; lemmas chartaceous, margins membranous, 7-nerved, 4-6 mm long; palea linear, chartaceous, 2-keeled, 4 mm long.

Perennial, tufted. Culms few, 75–150 cm tall, 2–2.5 mm in diam., many-noded. Leaves all cauline; leaf sheaths much longer than internodes, scaberulous or puberulous, lower sheaths with reduced blades, often retrorsely setose; leaf blades broadly linear, 10–25 cm × 6–14 mm, abaxial surface smooth, adaxial surface hispid or pilose, often sparsely; ligule 0.2–0.5 mm. Panicle lax, 15–35 cm; branches 2 or 3 per node, ascending or spreading, branched, up to 15 cm, spikelets diffuse. Spikelets linear-lanceolate, 5–9.5 mm, green, fertile florets 1 or 2, 1 smaller sterile floret raised on ca. 2 mm internode; glumes unequal, clearly shorter than adjacent florets, lower glume narrowly ovate, 2.5–3.5 mm, upper glume lanceolate-oblong, 4–5 mm, both obtuse to acute; lemmas lanceolate-oblong, lowest 4.8–5.5 mm, herbaceous, granular-scaberulous, 7-veined, additional weaker veins sometimes present, upper margins and apex broadly membranous, apex obtuse; palea keels scaberulous near apex, otherwise smooth. Anthers 0.8–1.5 mm. Fl. and fr. May–Oct. 2n = 18.

Rhizomatous perennial; culms 75-110 cm high, erect or ascending. Leaf-blades ± linear, 20-35 cm long, 3.5-11 mm wide, broadest in the middle, flat or convulute when dry, scaberulous and sometimes also loosely hispid; ligule truncate, 0.5-1 mm long; sheaths smooth and glabrous or thinly retrorsely hispid. Panicle 20-35 cm long, lax, the branches distant, 7-12 cm long, ascending, bearing spikelets on pedicels 1-5 mm long. Spikelets oblong, 6.5-8 mm long with 2 fertile florets scarcely distinguished from the sterile and separated by an internode about 2 mm long; glumes elliptic or lanceolate, acute, broadly membranous, the lower 2.5-3.3 mm long, the upper 4-5 mm long; lemma of fertile floret elliptic-oblong, 4.5-5.5 mm long, subacute or obtuse with broadly membranous tip, strongly 7-nerved and often with weaker intermediate nerves, scaberulous.

Distributed in Japan, Korea and northern China.

Anhui, Gansu, Guizhou, Hebei, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Ningxia, Shaanxi, Shandong, Shanxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Xizang, Yunnan, Zhejiang [Japan, Kashmir, Korea, N Pakistan].

Distribution: Pakistan (N.W.F.P. & Kashmir); China and Japan.

Woodlands, damp shady places on hillsides, gullies, roadsides; 400–2500 m.

Melica matsumurae Hackel; M. kumana Honda; M. scabe-rrima (Nees ex Steudel) J. D. Hooker var. micrantha J. D. Hooker.