Button grass

Dactyloctenium radulans

Slender tufted annual or short-lived perennial to c. 0.2 m high; culms decumbent, ascending or rarely erect.

Leaves with ligule c. 0.5 mm long; blade 2–6 mm wide, often scattered with rigid tubercle-based hairs to 1.5 mm long, margins scabrous with rigid tubercle-based hairs to 2 mm long.

Spikes 3–10, each 0.5–1.5 cm long, ending in a sterile rachis point. Spikelets c. 5 mm long, 2–4-flowered. Lower glume narrow-ovate, acute, 1–2 mm long; upper oblong-elliptic, obtuse, 1.5–3 mm long, keel extended into an awn 0.5–2.5 mm long or apex acuminate. Lemmas ovate, blunt, 2.5–4 mm long, awn c. 0.5 mm long.