Parapholis

Parapholis is a genus of herbaceous plants, belonging to the Poaceae family. It has seven species that are distributed throughout southwestern Asia, northern Africa and Europe where it populates the Mediterranean region. It has also been introduced to America and Australia. It grows in moderately brackish soils and in humid marls from 140 to 1000 meters of altitude.

Description

It is a grassy herbaceous plant with a long spike that has the spikelets very closely attached to the axis, with what looks like an elongated, thin and rigid cane, this can be slightly curved or very curved and even spiral, in the species P. bend. Blooms in late spring and early summer.

They are annual plants. Stems frequently branched. Leaves with sheaths with free margins; ligule short, usually truncate, membranous; blade flat or folded, rarely convoluted. Inflorescence in a spike, with a markedly excavated axis, disarticulating at maturity. Spikelets with 1 single fertile flower and 2 glumes longer than the flower, covering each excavation of the axis, except at the anthesis. Coriaceous glumes, with 5 very marked nerves and 1 transverse groove at the base. Membranous, three-veined lemma. Palea as long as the lemma, membranous, bidentate, with 2 slightly marked keels, generally puberulent on the upper part. Androecium with 3 stamens. Ovary glabrous.

Taxonomy

The genus was described by Charles Edward Hubbard and published in Blumea, Supplement 3: 14. 1946. The type species is: Parapholis incurva (L.) C.E. Hubb.

Etymology

Parapholis: generic name derived from the Greek para = (close) and Pholiurus (a related genus of herbs); alternatively, from the Greek para = (close) and pholis = (scale), alluding to the collateral glumes.

Cytology

It has a chromosome number of: x = 7, 9, and 19. 2n = 14, 28, 32, 36, 38, and 42. 2, 4, and 6 ploidies. ‘Large’ chromosomes.

Species

• Parapholis filiformis (Roth) C. E. Hubbard
• Parapholis gracilis
• Parapholis incurva (L.) C. E. Hubbard
• Parapholis longiflora
• Parapholis marginata
• Parapholis pycnanta
• Parapholis strigosa