Common Name: Guinea grass
Family: Poaceae
Common Synonyms: Panicum maximum
USDA Hardiness Zone: 8a-11
Growth Habit: Herb
Origin: Africa
FISC Category: 2
FDACS Listed Noxious Weed: No
Introduction Date: Earliest Florida specimen available vouchered in 1933
IFAS Assessment:
Robust, densely-tufted perennial grass to 3 m tall. Rhizome may bear hairy reduced-leaf remnants. Stem stout, erect, glabrous to hairy, nodes often densely hairy. Leaf sheath glabrous to stiff-hairy, often with dense patches of hair at junction with leaf blade. Ligule membranous, to 6 mm long. Leaf blade flat, linear, to 90 cm long and 3.5 cm wide, glabrous to softly or coarsely hairy on upper surface, margin may be rough to the touch. Inflorescence a many-branched, erect or slightly nodding panicle, to 60 cm tall and 20 cm wide, with 3-7 whorled lower branchlets. Spikelets clustered on branchlets, short stalked, to 4 mm long, green to purplish, oblong, blunt-tipped or slightly pointed, glabrous or slightly hairy, first glume 1/3 length of spikelet, second glume equal length to spikelet, upper floret fertile, developing a dull, white seed.
Mesic flatwoods, coastal strand, maritime hammock, xeric hammock, sandhill, scrub, pine rockland.
Fast growing. Widely established except in the panhandle.
NA
Langeland, K.A., H.M. Cherry, C.M. McCormick, K.C. Burks. 2008. Identification and Biology of Non-Native Plants in Florida's Natural Areas-Second Edition. IFAS Publication SP 257. University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida.
Tropical Forages Fact Sheet. http:/www.tropicalforages.info/key/forages/media/Htmi/Panicum_maximum.htm. Accessed on December 10, 2013.
Dave's Garden. 2013. PlantFiles: Guinea grass, Panicum maximum. http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/59767/. Accessed on December 10, 2013.