Citation: F. Muell. ex Benth., Fl. Aust. 7:649 (1878).

Synonymy: E. rankingii Bailey, Dept Agric. Brisbane Bot. Bull. 17:22 (1891).

Common name: Purple lovegrass.

Description:
Annual or short-lived perennial 12-60 cm high, with a glabrous or a sparsely hairy scarcely thickened base; culms simple or branched, wiry, 4-6-noded; leaves hirsute to pilose with delicate tubercle-based hairs or tubercled only; sheaths sometimes bearded at the orifice and ciliate on the margins; blades 2-7 cm long, tightly convolute, filiform.

Panicle 4-24 x 2-12 cm, often occupying about half the length of the plant, open with stiffly spreading spikelets, broadly oblong-ovate; primary branches 3-6 cm long, divided from or near the base; spikelets often biconvex, 5-22.5 x 0.7-1.5 mm, closely 9-43-flowered, linear; rhachilla persistent, internodes c. 0.5 mm long; glumes scarious to cartilaginous, ovate and acute or the lower linear-lanceolate and acuminate, scaberulous on the keel, 0.5-1.1 mm long, subequal or the upper larger; lemmas 1-1.5 mm long, cartilaginous, broadly elliptic or ovate, sometimes almost orbicular, obtuse or abruptly acute, scaberulous on the keel near the apex otherwise smooth, often glossy and purple; lateral nerves prominent or faint; palea spathulate or obovate, obtuse or subacute; keels scaberulous in the upper part.

Grain laterally compressed or flattened, ovate or oblong, convex on the front, concave or grooved on the back.

Published illustration: Lazarides (1970) The grasses of Central Australia, pl. 38c; Cunningham et al. (1982) Plants of western New South Wales, p. 102.

Distribution:  S.Aust.: NW, LE, EA, MU.   All mainland States. Conservation status: native Flowering time: Dec. — March.

SA Distribution Map based on current data relating to specimens held in the State Herbarium of South Australia

Biology: No text

Author: Not yet available