臭草屬

Perennial; lowes culm internode often thickened into a storage organ and sometimes bulbous; leaf-blades occasionally with cross-nerves. Panicle loose or dense, usually narrow, often scanty and sometimes raceme-like. Spikelets 1-several-flowerd, teminating in a clavate clump of 2-3 rudiments or rarely in a little floret, disarticulating below glumes or below lowest floret, reluctantly between florets; glumes shorter than lemma or as long as spikelets, papery with hyaline tips, often colourful, 3-5-nerved, obtuse or acute; lemmas mostly coriaceous but sometimes membranous, often hyaline towards tip, 5-9(-13)-nerved, notched obtuse or acute, sometimes mucronate; floret callus glabrous.

Species ± 80. Temperate regions throughout the world, except Australia.

Woodland shade to dry stony slopes.

Lower Taxon

• Melica onoei Franch. & Sav.