Schizachyrium fragile

Schizachyrium fragile, sometimes called fragile bluestem, is a tufted annual or short-lived perennial grass of warm tropical and subtropical regions, particularly common in northern Australia and parts of Southeast Asia. Plants grow 30-80 cm tall, with slender, wiry, often geniculate culms arising from small tussocks. The narrow leaf blades are 5-20 cm long and 2-4 mm wide, flat or folded, glaucous green, and finely scabrid on the margins. Inflorescences consist of paired, fragile racemes 2-4 cm long borne on long peduncles, each raceme readily breaking at the joints at maturity, hence the epithet. Each rachis joint bears a sessile, awned fertile spikelet and a pedicelled sterile one; the twisted awns are 1-2 cm long and golden brown. Flowering follows the wet season. It grows on sandy or stony soils in open savannah, woodland edges, and disturbed roadsides.