This grass is known as "long-styled feather
grass" in Australia ("foxtail" in
Toowoomba, Queensland) and "feather-top" in
the United States. It is a perennial tussock grass
with a creeping rhizome; culms up to 90 cm high in
cultivated plants, simple or branched from the lower
nodes, with leaf-sheaths compressed and keeled,
bearded at the mouth and usually hairy on the margins
upwards; leaf-blades glabrous, 2-6 mm wide, expanded
or folded. The inflorescence is a feathery spike 4- 7
cm long, dense, light brown or green. It differs from
P. setaceum in that its spike is usually ovoid and
light brown. It is native to Africa but naturalized
in the United States and Australia. The chromosome
numbers are 2n=18, 27, 36, 45, 54 (Fedorov, 1974). It
is cultivated as an ornamental in Ethiopia, southern
Africa and the United States. It has become a weed on
the latosolic soil on basalt around Toowoomba,
Queensland, at an altitude of 600-650 m, with
rainfall of 750 mm per year.
