Oryza glaberrima Steud.

Global description

Oryza glaberrima is a rice species native to West Africa, which is cultivated in Senegal's flood plains at Lake Chad. It is an annual upright rice, about 1m high, with strong rooting. It is characterized by a rounded ligule, persistent spikelets that are usually without ridge.

General habit

It is an annual wild rice with erect habit about 1 m high.

Underground system

The roots are fasciculate.

Culm

The erect culm is 90 cm to 1m high. It is glabrous, spongy, compressed at the base.

Leaf

The sheath is glabrous. The ligule of the lower leaves is membranous, rounded or truncated prolonged by auricles. It measures less than 6 mm in length. The linear blade with a tapered end is up to 30 cm long and 10 to 15 mm wide. It is flat, glabrous, with scabrid margin in its upper part.

Inflorescence

The inflorescence is a loose panicle 20 to 25 cm long. The twigs are bent to maturity.

Spikelet

The spikelets are persistent. It is usually awnless. The spikelet is oblong. It is usually 7 to 8 mm long. Glumes are reduced to membranous bulges at the top of the pedicel. The lower flowers are sterile and represented by two vestigial lemmas at the bae of the spikelet. They are white, triangular, 2.5 mm long. The lemmas and palea of the fertile flower are leathery and glabrous, smooth sometimes hispid. The lemma is usually awnless or sometimes with a smooth or barely scaberulous awn. The palea is narrower than the lemma. The flower contains 6 stamens.

Grain

The grain is oblong. It is 5 to 6 mm long.

https://www.gbif.org/species/2703464