Aristida funiculata Trin. & Rupr.

Oases (Uweinat), Mediterranean region, eastern desert, Gebel Elba and Sinai.

Tropical Africa from Senegal to Somalia and Kenya, to Egypt, Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Myanmar.

Sandy soils.

Annual.

Tufted annual with wiry culms 15-30 cm high. Leaf-blades flat or folded. 4-10 cm long and up to 2 mm wide. Panicle linear, up to 10 cm long, few-flowered. Spikelets green, tinged with brown; glumes linear, membranous, the lower (11-) 13-22 mm long, the upper (10)12-20 mm long, both finely attenuate; lemma, cylindrical, about 4 mm long, scabrid above, articulated at the apex; callus about 2 mm long, conical, pungent; column (0.8-)2-4.5 cm long, the base as wide as the summit of the lemma, straight for a short distance, thereafter strongly twisted; awn-branches subequal, 2.5-4.5 cm long.

Distribution: Pakistan (Sind, Baluchistan, Punjab & Kashmir); tropical East Africa, through Arabia to the Middle East and India.

Fl. & Fr. Per.: June -September.