78 



Panicum. This great genus is sometimes taken as includ- 

 ing- Digitaria, Axonopus and Trickolaena, but even excluding 

 these it is one of the largest in South Africa. Of the forty 

 odd species, only one or two enter into Grassveld of the climax 

 type, though many ruderals are common in the earlier stages 

 of sub-seres in waste land, and are eaten by stock. The Grass- 

 veld species either belong to the section Brachiaria with 

 secund false spikes (P. serratum), or if the panicle is loose and 

 spreading, the Grassveld species differ from the others in being 

 caespitose in their habit and not trailing or spreading [P. 

 natalense, P. echlonii, P. dregeanum, P. minus}. 



The most important of these is P. natalense, which is 

 fairly common in climax grassland. P. echlonii is an early 

 flowering Mountain Veld species. P. serratum is widely dis- 

 tributed from the Cape to Natal and the Transvaal, common 

 enough, but it hardly forms societies. It is often found along 

 footpaths. P. minus with its variety planifolium is also widety 

 distributed, extending all over the West and penetrating into 

 Eastern Veld only in the transitional belt. P. dregeanum is 

 distinctly Eastern, but not very common. 



On the other hand, there are a number of species which are 

 very distinctly Western, e.g., P. brachyurum, P. chromato- 

 stigma, P. colonum, P. glomeratum, P. mesoroniuw, P. nigro- 

 pedatum, P. numidianura, P. rautanenii, P. sagittae folium, 

 P. schinzii, P. xantholeucum, and others. It must be remem- 

 bered that the Western side, though not so tropical at the 

 Eastern side, at the same latitudes, yet does become distinctly 

 so towards the north. The above species are all tropical. 

 Similarly in the sub-tropical parts of the northern Transvaal 

 .P. typhurum, P. aequinerve, P. nigropedatum, P. trichopus, 

 P. holubii, P. coloratura, P. dregeanum are found. 



Panicum maximum is widely distributed over South 

 Africa, but is hardly ever a Grassveld species. There are a 

 number of species which are confined to the coast belt of 

 Natal where they are characteristic of the margins of bush 

 or other moist situations. They are mostly species belonging 

 to the section eu-Panicum, wide spreading trailing forms 

 many noded and often branched, sometimes rooting: from the 

 nodes at the base. Among' them are included P. filiculme, 

 P. hymeniochilum with var. glandulosura, P. aequinerve, P. 

 perlaxum, P. chvsqveoidcs, P. latiemnnm , P. zizanioides, P. 

 meyerianum, P. proliferum var. paludosum (all from section 

 eu-Panicum), and P. curvatum (sect Vilfoideae) and P. 



