Grass Genera of the World

L. Watson and M. J. Dallwitz


Dendrocalamus Nees

From the Greek dendron (tree) and kalamos (reed): treelike reeds.

Including Klemachloa Parker, Neosinocalamus Keng f., Sinocalamus McClure

Excluding Gigantochloa, Oreobambos, Oxytenanthera

Habit, vegetative morphology. Perennial; caespitose. The flowering culms leafy. Culms 600–4000 cm high (D. giganteus being probably the tallest grass); woody and persistent; to 30 cm in diameter; branched above. Culm nodes glabrous. Primary branches/mid-culm node numerous. Culm sheaths deciduous in their entirety. Culm internodes solid, or hollow. Pluricaespitose. Rhizomes pachymorph. Plants unarmed. Young shoots intravaginal. Leaves not basally aggregated; auriculate (but usually inconspicuously so). Leaf blades broad; pseudopetiolate; without cross venation (but often with pellucid glands); disarticulating from the sheaths; rolled in bud; ligule present; 3 mm long. Contra-ligule present.

Reproductive organization. Plants bisexual, with bisexual spikelets; with hermaphrodite florets. Not viviparous.

Inflorescence. Inflorescence indeterminate; with pseudospikelets; usually comprising spikes of spikelet tufts; espatheate. Spikelet-bearing axes very much reduced and paniculate, or very much reduced and capitate.

Female-fertile spikelets. Spikelets 8–20 mm long; not noticeably compressed. Rachilla prolonged beyond the uppermost female-fertile floret; hairless.

Glumes two, or several (?); relatively large; very unequal to more or less equal; shorter than the adjacent lemmas; pointed, or not pointed (ovate, acute or mucronate); awnless; non-carinate; similar. Lower glume longer than half length of lowest lemma; 17 nerved (in material seen). Upper glume 19 nerved (in material seen).

Female-fertile florets 2–8. Lemmas similar in texture to the glumes; not becoming indurated; entire; pointed; awnless, or mucronate (?); hairless; non-carinate; without a germination flap; 29 nerved. Palea present; relatively long; entire, or apically notched, or deeply bifid; awnless, without apical setae; not indurated; several nerved (13 observed); 2-keeled (in lower florets), or keel-less (in upper florets). Lodicules absent (‘or very scarce’). Stamens 6. Anthers 2.5–5 mm long, or 7–10 mm long (in D. giganteus); penicillate, or not penicillate; with the connective apically prolonged. Ovary hairy; with a conspicuous apical appendage. The appendage broadly conical, fleshy. Styles fused. Stigmas 1(–3); red pigmented.

Fruit, embryo and seedling. Fruit free from both lemma and palea; small to medium sized. Hilum long-linear. Pericarp thick and hard (crustaceous or hardened); free. Embryo not visible. Endosperm hard; containing compound starch grains. Embryo with an epiblast; with a scutellar tail; with a negligible mesocotyl internode; with more than one scutellum bundle. Embryonic leaf margins overlapping.

First seedling leaf without a lamina.

Abaxial leaf blade epidermis. Costal/intercostal zonation conspicuous. Papillae present; costal and intercostal. Intercostal papillae over-arching the stomata (sometimes conspicuously so), or not over-arching the stomata; several per cell. Mid-intercostal long-cells rectangular; having markedly sinuous walls. Microhairs present; panicoid-type; 48–51(–57) microns long (in D. giganteus); 4.5–7.5 microns wide at the septum. Microhair total length/width at septum 7.6–10.7. Microhair apical cells 24–25.5(–30) microns long. Microhair apical cell/total length ratio 0.47–0.53. Stomata common; 22.5–27 microns long. Subsidiaries non-papillate; high dome-shaped and triangular. Guard-cells overlapped by the interstomatals. Intercostal short-cells common, or absent or very rare. Costal short-cells conspicuously in long rows, or predominantly paired, or neither distinctly grouped into long rows nor predominantly paired. Costal silica bodies saddle shaped, or tall-and-narrow, or oryzoid.

Transverse section of leaf blade, physiology. C3; XyMS+. Mesophyll with non-radiate chlorenchyma; with adaxial palisade; with arm cells; with fusoids. The fusoids external to the PBS. Leaf blade ‘nodular’ in section to adaxially flat; with the ribs more or less constant in size (low), or with the ribs very irregular in sizes. Midrib conspicuous; having complex vascularization. Bulliforms present in discrete, regular adaxial groups; in simple fans (sometimes large-celled, Zea-type). All the vascular bundles accompanied by sclerenchyma. Combined sclerenchyma girders present; forming ‘figures’.

Cytology. Chromosome base number, x = 12. 2n = 48, 64, and 72 (rarely 70). 4, 5, and 6 ploid.

Taxonomy. Bambusoideae; Bambusodae; Bambuseae.

Distribution, ecology, phytogeography. About 35 species; China, Indomalayan region. Commonly adventive.

Paleotropical. Indomalesian. Indian, Indo-Chinese, and Malesian.

Rusts and smuts. Rusts — Dasturella. Taxonomically wide-ranging species: Dasturella divina.

Economic importance. Significant weed species: D. giganteus. D. strictus, with solid culms, is a very important timber species; others (e.g. D.asper, D. latiflorus) have edible shoots; and splits of several species are used for weaving baskets etc.

References, etc. Leaf anatomical: Metcalfe 1960; this project.

Illustrations. • Abaxial epidermis of leaf blade. • Leaf blade transverse section


Cite this publication as: Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M. J. (1992 onwards). ‘Grass Genera of the World: Descriptions, Illustrations, Identification, and Information Retrieval; including Synonyms, Morphology, Anatomy, Physiology, Phytochemistry, Cytology, Classification, Pathogens, World and Local Distribution, and References.’ http://biodiversity.uno.edu/delta/. Version: 18th August 1999. Dallwitz (1980), Dallwitz, Paine and Zurcher (1993 onwards, 1998), and Watson and Dallwitz (1994), and Watson, Dallwitz, and Johnston (1986) should also be cited (see References).

Index