Melica L.
Melica: an ancient Italian name for a sorghum.
Including Beckeria Bernh., Bromelica (Thurber) Farw., Claudia Opiz, Dalucum Adans., Verinea Merino
Habit, vegetative morphology. Perennial; rhizomatous. Culms 10–150(–200) cm high; herbaceous; scandent (M. sarmentosa, via filiform, retrorsely scabrid leaf blade tips), or not scandent; unbranched above; tuberous (often), or not tuberous. Culm internodes hollow. Leaves auriculate, or non-auriculate. Sheath margins joined. Leaf blades linear; broad to narrow; 1.3–15 mm wide; flat, or rolled (convolute); cross veined (rarely), or without cross venation; rolled in bud; an unfringed membrane to a fringed membrane, or a fringe of hairs (rarely); truncate, or not truncate; 0.1–4 mm long.
Reproductive organization. Plants bisexual, with bisexual spikelets; with hermaphrodite florets; exposed-cleistogamous, or chasmogamous.
Inflorescence. Inflorescence few spikeleted to many spikeleted; a single raceme, or paniculate; open, or contracted; with capillary branchlets, or without capillary branchlets; espatheate; not comprising ‘partial inflorescences’ and foliar organs. Spikelet-bearing axes persistent. Spikelets secund, or not secund; pedicellate.
Female-fertile spikelets. Spikelets 4–20 mm long; compressed laterally to not noticeably compressed; disarticulating above the glumes, or falling with the glumes (and sometimes disarticulating both above and below them); not disarticulating between the florets, or disarticulating between the florets (tardily or reluctantly); with conventional internode spacings, or with a distinctly elongated rachilla internode between the glumes. Rachilla prolonged beyond the uppermost female-fertile floret; hairless; the rachilla extension with incomplete florets. Hairy callus absent. Callus short (glabrous).
Glumes two; relatively large; very unequal to more or less equal; shorter than the spikelets, or about equalling the spikelets (usually?); shorter than the adjacent lemmas, or long relative to the adjacent lemmas (usually?); pointed, or not pointed; awnless; non-carinate; very dissimilar (the lower sometimes greatly enlarged), or similar (often coloured, papery, thin-tipped). Lower glume 1–7 nerved. Upper glume (3–)5–7 nerved. Spikelets with incomplete florets. The incomplete florets distal to the female-fertile florets. The distal incomplete florets merely underdeveloped, or clearly specialised and modified in form (often, modified as a ball of successively enveloped lemmas or as a swollen rachilla extension). Spikelets without proximal incomplete florets.
Female-fertile florets 1–7. Lemmas similar in texture to the glumes to decidedly firmer than the glumes (usually leathery, sometimes membranous); entire, or incised; when entire pointed, or blunt; awnless, or mucronate, or awned. Awns when present, 1; from a sinus, or apical; non-geniculate; straight; hairless; much shorter than the body of the lemma to about as long as the body of the lemma. Lemmas hairy, or hairless; non-carinate; without a germination flap; 5–9(–15) nerved. Palea present; relatively long, or conspicuous but relatively short, or very reduced; entire, or apically notched (bidentate); thinner than the lemma; 2-nerved; 2-keeled. Lodicules present; 2; joined; fleshy; glabrous; not or scarcely vascularized. Stamens 3. Anthers 0.6–3.5 mm long; not penicillate. Ovary glabrous; without a conspicuous apical appendage. Styles free to their bases. Stigmas 2.
Fruit, embryo and seedling. Fruit free from both lemma and palea; small; sometimes red; longitudinally grooved; compressed dorsiventrally, or not noticeably compressed. Hilum long-linear. Pericarp thin. Embryo small. Endosperm hard; without lipid; containing compound starch grains. Embryo with an epiblast; without a scutellar tail; with a negligible mesocotyl internode. Embryonic leaf margins meeting.
Seedling with a long mesocotyl; with a loose coleoptile, or with a tight coleoptile. First seedling leaf with a well-developed lamina. The lamina broad, or narrow; erect; 3–5 veined.
Abaxial leaf blade epidermis. Costal/intercostal zonation conspicuous. Papillae absent. Long-cells similar in shape costally and intercostally, or markedly different in shape costally and intercostally; of similar wall thickness costally and intercostally, or differing markedly in wall thickness costally and intercostally. Mid-intercostal long-cells rectangular, or fusiform; having markedly sinuous walls, or having straight or only gently undulating walls. Microhairs absent. Stomata absent or very rare, or common. Subsidiaries parallel-sided. Intercostal short-cells common, or absent or very rare; not paired; silicified, or not silicified. Intercostal silica bodies when seen tall-and-narrow. Costal short-cells conspicuously in long rows, or predominantly paired, or neither distinctly grouped into long rows nor predominantly paired. Costal silica bodies horizontally-elongated crenate/sinuous, or horizontally-elongated smooth, or rounded; not sharp-pointed.
Transverse section of leaf blade, physiology. C3; XyMS+. Mesophyll with non-radiate chlorenchyma. Leaf blade with distinct, prominent adaxial ribs, or adaxially flat; with the ribs more or less constant in size. Midrib conspicuous, or not readily distinguishable; with one bundle only. Bulliforms present in discrete, regular adaxial groups (at the bases of the furrows); in simple fans (and sometimes also in groups of small, irregularly sized cells, cf. Ammophila). All the vascular bundles accompanied by sclerenchyma. Combined sclerenchyma girders present; forming ‘figures’, or nowhere forming ‘figures’. Sclerenchyma all associated with vascular bundles.
Phytochemistry. Leaves without flavonoid sulphates (2 species).
Special diagnostic feature. Spikelets with the distal incomplete florets and/or the rachilla apex forming a terminal clavate appendage, or spikelets without a terminal clavate appendage.
Cytology. Chromosome base number, x = 9. 2n = 14 (rarely), or 18, or 36. 2 and 4 ploid. Chromosomes ‘fairly large’. Nucleoli disappearing before metaphase.
Taxonomy. Pooideae; Poodae; Meliceae.
Distribution, ecology, phytogeography. About 80 species; North temperate, southern Africa and South America. Mesophytic to xerophytic; shade species and species of open habitats.
Holarctic, Paleotropical, Neotropical, Cape, and Antarctic. Boreal, Tethyan, and Madrean. African and Indomalesian. Euro-Siberian, Eastern Asian, Atlantic North American, and Rocky Mountains. Macaronesian, Mediterranean, and Irano-Turanian. Saharo-Sindian and Sudano-Angolan. Indian and Indo-Chinese. Caribbean, Pampas, and Andean. Patagonian. European and Siberian. Canadian-Appalachian, Southern Atlantic North American, and Central Grasslands. South Tropical African.
Rusts and smuts. Rusts — Puccinia. Taxonomically wide-ranging species: Puccinia graminis, Puccinia coronata, Puccinia brachypodii, Puccinia poarum, and Puccinia schedonnardi. Smuts from Tilletiaceae and from Ustilaginaceae. Tilletiaceae — Urocystis. Ustilaginaceae — Sphacelotheca and Ustilago.
References, etc. Leaf anatomical: Metcalfe 1960; this project.
Illustrations. • General aspect. • Inflorescence detail. Melica californica. Each spikelet with a modified rachilla extension bearing sterile florets forming a clubshaped tip. • Spikelets. • Spikelet tip
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).
