Flora-Fauna

Phragmites australis (Cav.) Trin. ex Steud.

First published in Nomencl. Bot., ed. 2. 2: 324 (1841).

(Nouvelle Flore du Liban et de la Syrie, vol. 1, p. 75, under Phragmites communis, Pl. XXIII, 3; 1966)

Description

Life-form & habit: Perennial, somewhat glaucous reed with a creeping, much-branched rhizome and sheathed young shoots. Hairless, erect stems 60 cm to 6 m tall and 5–20 mm thick.

Leaves: Sheaths closely applied, striated and hairless, with ear-like lobes and hairs at the mouth. Ligule very short and densely fringed. Leaf blades taper to a sometimes prickly tip, reaching 50 cm long and 3 cm wide.

Inflorescence & flowers: Long-stalked brown or violet panicle, oval or oblong, erect or slightly nodding, up to 40 × 18 cm. Branches rough and much divided. Spikelets 10–17 mm long, with 4–10 flowers. Glumes unequal: lower 3–6 mm, upper 6–12 mm. Fertile lemmas hairless, 10–14 mm; the callus bears long silky hairs.

Flowering and habitat

Habitat & elevation: Mouterde distinguishes very tall, broad-leaved plants in permanently wet places from short, slender plants with narrow, rolled, prickly leaves on relatively dry soils.

Distribution

Lebanese distribution: Nahr Ghadir, Beirut, Tripoli, Dimane, Chtaura, Zahle, Taanayel, Haouch Mandara and Qamouat Hermel.

Syrian distribution: Doueir near Homs, Jisr ech Choghour, Raboue, Damascus, Ghouta, Khatounie and the saltworks near Palmyra.

Recorded locations: Bekish.

Native range: Afghanistan, Alabama, Albania, Alberta, Algeria, Altay, Amur, Angola, Argentina Northeast, Argentina Northwest, Argentina South, Arizona, Arkansas, Austria, Baleares, Baltic States, Belarus, Belgium, Belize, Benin, Bolivia, Botswana, British Columbia, Bulgaria, Burkina, Buryatiya, California, Cameroon, Canary Is., Cape Provinces, Cape Verde, Central European Russia, Chad, Chile Central, Chile North, Chile South, China North-Central, China South-Central, China Southeast, Chita, Colombia, Colorado, Congo, Connecticut, Corse, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Czechia-Slovakia, Delaware, Denmark, District of Columbia, DR Congo, East Aegean Is., East European Russia, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Eritrea, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Finland, Florida, France, Free State, French Guiana, Gambia, Georgia, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Guatemala, Guinea-Bissau, Gulf of Guinea Is., Gulf States, Guyana, Hainan, Honduras, Hungary, Idaho, Illinois, India, Indiana, Inner Mongolia, Iowa, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Irkutsk, Italy, Japan, Kamchatka, Kansas, Kazakhstan, Kentucky, Kenya, Khabarovsk, Kirgizstan, Korea, Krasnoyarsk, Kriti, Krym, Kuril Is., Kuwait, KwaZulu-Natal, Lebanon-Syria, Lesotho, Libya, Louisiana, Madeira, Maine, Malaya, Manchuria, Manitoba, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mauritania, Mexico Central, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Mongolia, Montana, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Nansei-shoto, Nebraska, Nepal, Netherlands, Nevada, New Brunswick, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New South Wales, New York, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Norfolk Is., North Carolina, North Caucasus, North Dakota, North European Russia, Northern Provinces, Northern Territory, Northwest European Russia, Northwest Territories, Norway, Nova Scotia, NW. Balkan Pen., Ohio, Oklahoma, Oman, Ontario, Oregon, Pakistan, Palestine, Panamá, Pennsylvania, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Primorye, Prince Edward I., Qinghai, Queensland, Québec, Rhode I., Romania, Sakhalin, Sardegna, Saskatchewan, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Sicilia, Sinai, Somalia, South Australia, South Dakota, South European Russia, Spain, Sudan-South Sudan, Suriname, Sweden, Switzerland, Tadzhikistan, Tasmania, Tennessee, Texas, Tibet, Transcaucasus, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Tuva, Türkiye, Türkiye-in-Europe, Ukraine, Uruguay, Utah, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Vermont, Victoria, Vietnam, Virginia, Washington, West Himalaya, West Siberia, West Virginia, Western Australia, Western Sahara, Wisconsin, Wyoming, Xinjiang, Yakutiya, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

Introduced into: Bahamas, Brazil Southeast, Cook Is., Dominican Republic, Haiti, Hawaii, Leeward Is., New Caledonia, New Zealand North, New Zealand South, Newfoundland, Puerto Rico, South Carolina, Trinidad-Tobago, Windward Is..

⚠️ Taxonomic note:

Mouterde treats this reed broadly as Phragmites communis and regards var. isiacus as dominant, possibly exclusive, locally. Kew places P. communis Trin. under P. australis subsp. australis and also accepts subsp. isiacus within P. australis. This description retains the CMS identification at species level and does not assign the recorded plant to a subspecies. Mouterde gives no flowering period in this account.