Polytoca digitata (L. fil.) Druce

The zonation of the mixed-sex racemes is obvious, with the tough, yellowish female spikelets, which often have the long stigmas exserted, located below the more slender, green male portion.

Perennial from short stout rhizome. Culms erect, up to 3 m tall, 4–8 mm in diam., branched, 6–10-noded, nodes densely bearded with upwardly pointing hairs. Leaf sheaths glabrous or setose with tubercle-based hairs; leaf blades cauline, up to 80 × 1–4 cm, abaxial surface glaucous, glabrous or setulose, margins serrate, apex acuminate; ligule 2–5 mm. Racemes 2–4, 4–12 cm. Female zone: sessile spikelet 8–11 mm; lower glume shortly hairy on back, longer hair tufts laterally at base of beak, beak ca. 3 mm, wings ca. 1 mm wide; lodicules absent; pedicelled spikelet 15–20 mm, asymmetrical, broadly winged on one side. Male zone: spikelets oblong-lanceolate, 8–10 mm; lower glume symmetrically winged on margins above middle, wing 0.5–1 mm wide. Fl. and fr. Jul–Sep.

Hill slopes, grasslands, roadsides. Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, Yunnan [Cambodia, NE India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, New Guinea, Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam].

Apluda digitata Linnaeus f., Suppl. Pl. 434. 1782 ["1781"]; Coix heteroclita Roxburgh; Polytoca bracteata R. Brown; P. heteroclita (Roxburgh) Koorders.