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Eleusine coracana subsp. africana

(African Finger Millet)

Common Names

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Common Names in English:

African Finger Millet

Description

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Family Poaceae

Annual or perennial herbs, or tall woody bamboos . Flowering stems (culms ) jointed , internodes hollow or solid; branches arising singly from nodes and subtended by a leaf sheath and 2-keeled prophyll, often fascicled in bamboos. Leaves arranged alternately in 2 ranks , differentiated into sheath, blade , and an adaxial erect appendage at sheath/blade junction (ligule) ; leaf sheath surrounding and supporting culm-internode, split to base or infrequently tubular with partially or completely fused margins , modified with reduced blade in bamboos (culm sheaths) ; leaf blades divergent, usually long, narrow and flat, but varying from inrolled and filiform to ovate , veins parallel, sometimes with cross-connecting veinlets (especially in bamboos) ; ligule membranous or a line of hairs . Inflorescence terminal or axillary , an open, contracted , or spikelike panicle, or composed of lax to spikelike racemes arranged along an elongate central axis, or digitate, paired , or occasionally solitary; axillary inflorescences often many, subtended by spatheoles (specialized bladeless leaf sheaths) and gathered into a leafy compound panicle; spikelets often aggregated into complex clusters in bamboos. Spikelets composed of distichous bracts arranged along a slender axis (rachilla) ; typically 2 lowest bracts (glumes ) empty, subtending 1 to many florets ; glumes often poorly differentiated from accompanying bracts in bamboos. Florets composed of 2 opposing bracts enclosing a single small flower, outer bract (lemma) clasping the more delicate, usually 2-keeled inner bract (palea) ; base of floret often with thickened prolongation articulated with rachilla (callus) ; lemma often with apical or dorsal bristle (awn ), glumes also sometimes awned . Flowers bisexual or unisexual ; lodicules (small scales representing perianth) 2, rarely 3 or absent, 3 to many in bamboos, hyaline or fleshy ; stamens 3 rarely 1, 2, 6, or more in some bamboos, hypogynous, filaments capillary , anthers versatile; ovary 1-celled, styles (1 or) 2(rarely 3), free or united at base, topped by feathery stigmas, exserted from sides or apex of floret. Fruit normally a dry indehiscent caryopsis with thin pericarp firmly adherent to seed, pericarp rarely free, fleshy in some bamboos; embryo small or large; hilum punctate to linear .

About 700 genera and 11,000 species: widely distributed in all regions of the world.[1]

Genus Eleusine

Annuals or tussocky perennials . Culms compressed . Leaf sheaths strongly keeled ; leaf blades linear , usually folded; ligule membranous, usually with a ciliate fringe . Inflorescence of digitate or subdigitate spikelike racemes clustered at the top of the culm; racemes with closely imbricate, biseriate spikelets , terminating in a fertile spikelet. Spikelets laterally compressed , florets several, disarticulating between the florets (except the cultivated species E. coracana) ; glumes shorter than lemmas, persistent , 1-3(-7) -veined, keeled, awnless; lemmas membranous, 3-veined, glabrous , strongly keeled, keel thickened with 1-3 closely spaced additional veins, obtuse or acute. Grain ellipsoid to subglobose, trigonous in section , ornamented, pericarp free . x = 9. Fl. and fr. Jul-Sep.

Nine species: mostly in E and NE tropical Africa, one species a pantropical weed and one cultivated as a cereal; two species (one introduced ) in China.

Eleusine, Acrachne, and Dactyloctenium form a group of closely related genera, remarkable for their unusual, ornamented grains enclosed within a free pericarp, which is easily removed when soaked in a drop of water.[2]

Taxonomy

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Unambiguous Synonyms

  1. Eleusine africana Kennedy & O'byrne
  2. Eleusine indica africana (Kennedy & O'byrne) S. M. Phillips

Notes

Name Status: Accepted Name . Latest taxonomic scrutiny: 15-Mar-2000.

Similar Species

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Members of the genus Eleusine

ZipcodeZoo has pages for 107 species, subspecies, varieties, forms, and cultivars in this genus. Here are just 100 of them:

E. aegyptia · E. aegyptiaca · E. aegyptica · E. africana · E. arabica · E. aristata · E. barbata · E. barcinonensis · E. blepharoglumis · E. brevifolia · E. caespitosa · E. calycina · E. caracana · E. cerealis · E. chinensis · E. ciliata · E. compressa · E. conglomerata · E. coracan · E. coracana · E. coracana africana (African Finger Millet) · E. coracana 'Green Cat' (Finger Millet) · E. coracana subsp. africana (African Finger Millet) · E. coracana coracana · E. corocana · E. cruciata · E. dagussa · E. digitaria · E. digitata · E. distachya · E. distans · E. domingensis · E. dura · E. elongata · E. erythrosperma · E. falcata · E. filiformis · E. flagellifera · E. floccifolia · E. geminata · E. glabra · E. glaucophylla · E. gonantha · E. gouini · E. gracilis · E. inaequalis · E. indica (Wire Grass Eleusine Indica) · E. indica africana · E. indica subsp. coracana · E. indica var. brachystachya · E. indica var. geminata · E. indica var. major · E. indica var. monostachya · E. intermedia · E. italica · E. jaegeri · E. japonica · E. juncea · E. kigeziensis · E. lagopoides · E. leucosperma · E. lima · E. longaspica · E. luco · E. macrosperma · E. macrostachya · E. marginata · E. mucronata · E. multiflora · E. obtusiflora · E. oligostachya · E. ovalis · E. pectinata · E. penicillata · E. pilosa · E. poaeflora · E. polydactyla · E. polystachya · E. procera · E. prostrata · E. racemosa · E. radulans · E. reniformis · E. rigida · E. rigidifolia · E. robecchii · E. scabra · E. scindica · E. semisterilis · E. somalensis · E. somaliensis · E. sparsa · E. sphaerosperma · E. stolonifera · E. stricta · E. tenerrima · E. textilis · E. tocussa · E. tristachia · E. tristachya (Three-Spike Goosegrass)

More Info

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Further Reading

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Notes

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Contributors

Identifiers

Footnotes

  1. Shou-liang Chen, De-Zhu Li, Guanghua Zhu, Zhenlan Wu, Sheng-lian Lu, Liang Liu, Zheng-ping Wang, Bi-xing Sun, Zheng-de Zhu, Nianhe Xia, Liang-zhi Jia, Zhenhua Guo, Wenli Chen, Xiang Chen, Yang Guangyao, Sylvia M. Phillips, Chris Stapleton, Robert J. Soreng, Susan G. Aiken, Nikolai N. Tzvelev, Paul M. Peterson, Stephen A. Renvoize, Marina V. Olonova & Klaus Ammann "Poaceae". in Flora of China Vol. 22. Published by Science Press (Beijing) and Missouri Botanical Garden Press. Online at EFloras.org. [back]
  2. Shou-liang Chen & Sylvia M. Phillips "Eleusine". in Flora of China Vol. 22 Page 458, 481. Published by Science Press (Beijing) and Missouri Botanical Garden Press. Online at EFloras.org. [back]
Last Revised: 2009-07-04