Melinis minutiflora

Melinis minutiflora, the molasses grass, is a tufted, aromatic perennial grass in the Poaceae growing 60–150 cm tall, sometimes scrambling and forming dense, matted stands. Culms are slender, ascending to decumbent, often rooting at the lower nodes, and clothed throughout in long, dense, sticky glandular hairs that exude a strong molasses-like fragrance. Leaf sheaths are densely hairy; the ligule is a short ciliate membrane; blades are flat, soft, light green to purplish, 5–20 cm long and 4–10 mm wide, sparsely hairy on both surfaces. The inflorescence is an open, often purplish or reddish-tinged terminal panicle 10–30 cm long, with slender, scabrous branches bearing very small, two-flowered spikelets 1.5–2 mm long. The lower glume is minute and the upper glume long-awned; the upper lemma bears a fine, flexuous awn 5–15 mm long. The grain is small and oblong. It is native to tropical Africa and has become widely naturalized as a forage and pasture grass and as an invasive weed in tropical America, Asia, and Australia.