Avena strigosa Schreb.

Rather slender, erect, glaucous tufts, 80–120 cm. Leaf-sheath glabrous or finely hairy. Ligule 2.5–5.5 mm, obtuse, denticulate, abaxially minutely scabrid. Leaf-blade 15–30 cm × 4.5–13.5 mm, finely scabrid on ribs and margins, occasionally with scattered sparse hairs. Culm internodes glabrous. Panicle (12)–18–26 cm, erect or drooping at tip, rather dense, equilateral, rather narrow; rachis smooth, branches and pedicels fine, minutely scabrid. Spikelets 35–40 mm, 2-flowered, falling at maturity only after fracture of rachis. Glumes 7–(9)-nerved. Lemma 11–15 mm, narrow-lanceolate, light brown or straw-coloured, later becoming darker, smooth and shining below level of awn insertion, green and scabrid above, often with a very few fine hairs near base of awn, each lobe-tip produced to a fine purplish bristle 5–7.5 mm, and often with lateral setae to 1 mm; both lemmas awned, awn 25–35 mm, geniculate, column mid-brown, twisted. Palea keel with one row of cilia, interkeel finely scabrid to minutely hairy above. Callus glabrous or with a few short hairs. Rachilla prolongation glabrous, tipped by few to numerous short hairs. Anthers 2.2–4 mm.

[From: Edgar and Connor (2000) Flora of New Zealand. Volume 5 (second printing).]