Plants annual or perennial; shortly rhizomatous if perennial. Culms 20–100 cm. Sheaths open; auricles present, often inconspicuous; ligules 0.3–1 mm, membranous, truncate; blades 1–5 mm wide, flat, linear, central vein distinct on the abaxial side. Inflorescences terminal spikes, 4–12 cm long including the awns, 0.6–2 cm wide excluding the awns, compressed, dense, with 1 spikelet per node; rachis internodes flat, margins ciliate, hairs white; middle internodes 1–3 mm; disarticulation in the rachises, at the nodes beneath each spikelet. Spikelets 25–75 mm including the awns, 7–22 mm excluding the awns, more than 3 times the length of the rachis internodes, usually divergent, sometimes ascending, laterally compressed, with 2–4 florets, the lower 2 florets usually bisexual, the terminal florets sterile; rachilla internodes below the lower florets shorter than those below the terminal florets. Glumes equal, to 40 mm including the awns, to 8 mm excluding the awns, coriaceous, usually 5-veined, strongly 2-keeled, keels with 1–3 mm hairs, margins unequal, stiff, translucent, apices tapering into scabrous awns; bisexual lemmas 9–13 mm excluding the awns, lanceolate, keeled, usually 5-veined, apices acuminate, awned, awns to 60 mm; sterile lemmas smaller, awns to 10 mm; paleas narrowly lanceolate, membranous, 2-veined, 2-keeled; lodicules 2, free, membranous, ciliate or glabrous; anthers 3, 4–7 mm, yellow; ovaries pubescent; styles 2, free to the base. x = 7. Haplome V. Name from the Greek dasys, ‘shaggy’ or ‘hairy’, and pyros, ‘wheat’, an allusion to the hairy keels of the glumes.

Dasypyrum is a Mediterranean genus of two species; only one has been collected in the Flora region. The hairy, 2-keeled glumes make the genus easily distinguishable from other genera in the Triticeae.

SELECTED REFERENCE Frederiksen, S. 1991. Taxonomic studies in Dasypyrum (Poaceae). Nordic J. Bot. 11:135–142.