Gahnia baniensis Benl

Stems 1-3 m by 4-8 mm. Leaves long, coriaceous, involute, scabrid on the margins; sheaths blackish brown. Inflorescence supradecompound, 40-80 by 6-10 cm, loose, consisting of many more or less distant fascicles of loose, nodding partial panicles; primary branches 2 (more rarely 3) together, exserted from the sheath, rigid, erect, unequal in length, 10-20 cm long; secondary and tertiary branchlets arcuately recurved. Bracts usually shorter than the panicle, the lowest often not half the length of it. Spikelets in clusters of 2-3 or solitary, shortly peduncled, oblong, finally ovoid-ellipsoid, attenuate towards the base, blackish, 4-5 mm long, 2-flowered. Glumes 6-8, rigid, blackish brown, the lower 4 empty, keeled, shortly mucronate, the upper ones broader, obtuse, ciliolate on the margins. Stamens 2-3 in both flowers; filaments scarcely elongated after anthesis, cohering with their tips, finally c. 3 mm long. Nut ellipsoid, distinctly trigonous, 2½-3½ by c. 1¼. mm, shining stramineous to reddish brown, smooth. Endocarp not grooved. Cleaving-mechanism.

In thickets on hills and mountain ridges, in open country among bracken, mostly 900-2100 m, rarely down to 200 m.