Skip to main content

Elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum)

Rumput gajah or elephant grass or napier grass or Cenchrus purpureus (Pennisetum purpureum) is a plant species in Poaceae, a large and highly nutritious grass that is usually used for animal feed including cattle, goats, elephants, has resistance in the sun, has many varieties and cultivars.

P. purpureum grows upright like sugar cane and is up to 5 m high, 3 cm in diameter and easy to breed. The round stems, woody and hard, covered with leaf shields and haired, have up to 20 segments to grow new shoots that will become new stems.

Dlium Elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum)

Ribbon-shaped leaves, length 30-120 cm, width less than 3 cm, thin as paper. The upper surface is green, the lower surface is pale green, both surfaces and margins are rough by hair. A single bone in the middle, large and white.

Flowers grow in long bunches and erect with a golden color, grow at the tip of the uppermost stem, the seeds will have contents when growing at an altitude of more than 1000 meters. Leaves and stems contain 19.9% dry matter, 10.2% crude protein, 1.6% fat, 34.2% crude fiber, 11.7% ash and 42.3% extract material without nitrogen.

Elephant grass is very adaptive and productivity remains high in a variety of soil textures and marginal land, but optimal production is 60-70% soil moisture, pH 6.5, 1000 mm/year rainfall and short days with critical photoperiods 13-12 hour.

Rumput gajah has several cultivars including Muaklek, Bana, Taiwan A148, Common, Wruk wona, Tifton and Kampheng san. Many are cultivated for the purposes of animal feed, fiber production materials, soil erosion barriers and hedges.





Kingdom: Plantae
Phylum: Tracheophyta
Subphylum: Angiospermae
Class: Liliopsida
Order: Poales
Family: Poaceae
Subfamily: Panicoideae
Tribe: Paniceae
Genus: Pennisetum
Species: Pennisetum purpureum

Popular Posts

Humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) manufacture bubble-nets as tools to increase prey intake

NEWS - Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae ) create bubble net tools while foraging, consisting of internal tangential rings, and actively control the number of rings, their size, depth and horizontal spacing between the surrounding bubbles. These structural elements of the net increase prey intake sevenfold. Researchers have known that humpback whales create “bubble nets” for hunting, but the new report shows that the animals also manipulate them in a variety of ways to maximize catches. The behavior places humpbacks among the rare animals that make and use their own tools. “Many animals use tools to help them find food, but very few actually make or modify these tools themselves,” said Lars Bejder, director of the Marine Mammal Research Program (MMRP), University of Hawaii at Manoa. “Humpback whales in southeast Alaska create elaborate bubble nets to catch krill. They skillfully blow bubbles in patterns that form a web with internal rings. They actively control details such ...

Javan mocca or Javan slender caesar (Amanita javanica)

OPINION - Javan mocca or Javan slender caesar ( Amanita javanica ) is a mysterious fungus species and has been enigmatic since it was first reported by Boedijn in 1951 and after that no explanation or reporting of specimens is believed to be the same as expected. Boedijn (1951) described A. javanica which grew on Java island as having the characteristics covered in the Amanita genus. Corner and Bas in 1962 tried to describe Javan mocca and all species in Amanita based on specimens in Singapore. Over time some reports say that they have found A. javanica specimens in other Southeast Asia including also China, Japan, India and Nepal. But there is no definitive knowledge and many doubt whether the specimen is the same as described by Boedijn (1951). I was fortunate to have seen this species one afternoon and soon I took out a camera for some shots. In fact, I've only met this mushroom species once. Javan mocca is an endangered species and I have never seen in my experience in...

Gunung Sewu Geopark

Gunung Sewu Geopark or Gunung Sewu UNESCO Global Geopark or Pegunungan Sewu (Thousand mountains) are elongated mountains in Kulonprogo Regency, Bantul Regency and Gunung Kidul Regency in Yogyakarta Province, Wonogiri Regency in Central Java Province, to Tulungagung Regency in East Java Province on Java Island, Indonesia. The uniqueness of the ecosystem encourages the International Union of Speleology to propose the Sewu Mountains Karst Area into one of the world's natural heritages in 1993. On September 19 2015, UNESCO announced Gunung Sewu as the Global Geopark Network. Sewu Mountain is rich in biodiversity, archeology, history and cultural aspects. The Pacitan rock culture represents Paleolithic to Neolithic artifacts in Southeast Asia. About 1,802 square kilometers of the area contain traces of prehistoric settlements. Some prehistoric people lived in caves, while others lived in open spaces. Characteristics Gunung Sewu is a classic tropical karst landscape and is domin...