Thaumastochloa major

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Family Poaceae

Taxonomy: Thaumastochloa major S.T.Blake

Synonyms: 1 (APC 2026-07-30)

Thaumastochloa sp. (taxonomic synonym)

Misapplied names: 2 (APC 2026-07-30)

Thaumastochloa pubescens (Benth.) C.E.Hubb. (misapplied)
Thaumastochloa rariflora (F.M.Bailey) C.E.Hubb. (misapplied)

Distribution (APC): WA, NT, Qld

Profiles: APC, Flora of Australia, ALA, iNaturalist, NT eFlora, Florabase, ATRP

Traits

Top source datasets: Crowley_2007 (2), GrassBase_2014 (7), Kew_2019_1 (1), Lord_1997 (4), Metcalfe_2020_2 (15), Munroe_2019 (1), NHNSW_2014 (1), NTH_2022 (3), NTH_2023 (1), Nano_2011 (2), Osborne_2014 (1), Simpson_2021 (1), Sjostrom_2006 (4), WAH_2022_2 (4), WAH_2023_2 (3), Wenk_2022 (2), Wenk_2023 (1). See below for a full list of sources.
Summary: AusTraits contains 27 traits from 53 records in 17 datasets.

Traits by category (click to expand). For categorical traits, the values are listed. For numerical traits, the mean and range are shown.

fire response

resprouting_capacity (categorical): fire_killed (2) [sources: Crowley_2007; Nano_2011]

flower morphology

sex_type (categorical): hermaphrodite (2) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2; Sjostrom_2006]

fruit morphology

fruit_length (numerical): 2.3 mm (2.3-2.3 mm) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2]
fruit_type (categorical): caryopsis (4) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2; NTH_2023; Sjostrom_2006; WAH_2023_2]
fruit_fleshiness (categorical): dry (2) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2; Sjostrom_2006]
fruit_dehiscence (categorical): dehiscent (1); indehiscent (2) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2; Sjostrom_2006]

leaf morphology

leaf_area (numerical): 147 mm2 (147-147 mm2) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2]
leaf_length (numerical): 70 mm (20-120 mm) [sources: GrassBase_2014]
leaf_width (numerical): 3.5 mm (1.5-5.5 mm) [sources: GrassBase_2014]
leaf_compoundness (categorical): simple (1) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2]

life history

photosynthetic_pathway (categorical): c4 (3) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2; Munroe_2019; Osborne_2014]
plant_growth_form (categorical): graminoid (3); herb (1); tussock (2) [sources: Lord_1997; Metcalfe_2020_2; NTH_2022; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022]
life_form (categorical): therophyte (1) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2]
life_history (categorical): annual (4) [sources: NTH_2022; Simpson_2021; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2023]
woodiness_detailed (categorical): herbaceous (3) [sources: NTH_2022; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022]
stem_growth_habit (categorical): spreading (1) [sources: WAH_2022_2]
root_structure (categorical): non_mycorrhizal (1) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2]
pollination_syndrome (categorical): wind (1) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2]
dispersal_syndrome (categorical): anemochory (1); myrmecochory (1) [sources: Lord_1997; Metcalfe_2020_2]
dispersers (categorical): ants (1) [sources: Lord_1997]
flowering_time (categorical): nyyyyyyyyynn (1) [sources: NHNSW_2014]
vegetative_reproduction_ability (categorical): not_vegetative (1) [sources: Metcalfe_2020_2]
bud_bank_location (categorical): none (2) [sources: Crowley_2007; Nano_2011]

seed morphology

seed_dry_mass (numerical): 2.3 mg (1.7-2.9 mg) [sources: Kew_2019_1; Lord_1997]
seed_length (numerical): 2.3 mm (2.3-2.3 mm) [sources: GrassBase_2014]

whole plant morphology

plant_height (numerical): 0.25 m (0.1-0.4 m) [sources: GrassBase_2014; WAH_2023_2]

Sources

dataset_id	n_traits	n_records	reference
Metcalfe_2020_2	15	15	D. Metcalfe. “Unpublished data: Traits of Poaceae spp, CSIRO”. 2020.
GrassBase_2014	4	7	W. Clayton, M. Vorontsova, and K. H. &. H. Williamson. GrassBase - The online world grass flora. 2006. url: http://www.kew.org/data/grasses-db.html.
Lord_1997	4	4	J. Lord, J. Egan, T. Clifford, E. Jurado, M. Leishman, D. Williams, and M. Westoby. “Larger seeds in tropical floras: Consistent patterns independent of growth form and dispersal mode”. Journal of Biogeography 24 (1997), pp. 205-211. doi: 10.1046/j.1365-2699.1997.00126.x.
Sjostrom_2006	4	4	A. Sjöström and C. L. Gross. “Life-history characters and phylogeny are correlated with extinction risk in the Australian angiosperms”. Journal of Biogeography 33.2 (2006), pp. 271-290. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2699.2005.01393.x.
WAH_2022_2	4	4	Western Australian Herbarium. Florabase—the Western Australian Flora.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2022. url: https://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au/.
NTH_2022	3	3	D. of Land Resource Management and N. T. of Australia. Northern Territory Flora Online. accessed on 6 May, 2022.. 2022. url: http://eflora.nt.gov.au/.
WAH_2023_2	2	3	Western Australian Herbarium. Florabase—the Western Australian Flora.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2023. url: https://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au/.
Crowley_2007	2	2	G. Crowley, M. Gardener, and M. Marrinan. Tropical savannas fire response database. 2007. url: [www.landmanager.org.au](www.landmanager.org.au).
Nano_2011	2	2	C. E. M. Nano and P. J. Clarke. “How do drought and fire influence the patterns of resprouting in Australian deserts?”. Plant Ecology 212 (2011), pp. 2095-2110. doi: 10.1007/s11258-011-9988-x.
Wenk_2022	2	2	E. Wenk. “Unpublished data: Australian plant growth forms dataset”. 2022.
Kew_2019_1	1	1	Royal Botanic Gardens Kew. Seed Information Database (SID) and Seed Bank Database. 2019. url: http://data.kew.org/sid/.
Munroe_2019	1	1	S. E. M. Munroe, F. A. McInerney, J. Andrae, N. Welti, G. R. Guerin, E. Leitch, T. Hall, S. Szarvas, R. Atkins, S. Caddy-Retalic, and B. Sparrow. “The Photosynthetic Pathways of Plant Species Surveyed in Australia's National Terrestrial Monitoring Network”. Scientific Data 8 (2021), p. 97. doi: 10.1038/s41597-021-00877-z.
NHNSW_2014	1	1	Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney. PLantNET. 2014. url: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/search/simple.htm.
NTH_2023	1	1	D. of Land Resource Management and N. T. of Australia. Northern Territory Flora Online. accessed on 6 May, 2022.. 2022. url: http://eflora.nt.gov.au/.
Osborne_2014	1	1	C. Osborne, A. Salomaa, T. Kluyver, V. Visser, E. Kellogg, O. Morrone, M. Vorontsova, W. Clayton, and D. Simpson. “A global database of C4 photosynthesis in grasses”. New Phytologist 204 (2014), pp. 441-446. doi: 10.1111/nph.12942.
Simpson_2021	1	1	K. J. Simpson, E. C. Jardine, S. Archibald, E. J. Forrestel, C. E. R. Lehmann, G. H. Thomas, and C. P. Osborne. “Resprouting grasses are associated with less frequent fire than seeders”. New Phytologist 230 (2021), pp. 832-844. doi: 10.1111/nph.17069.
Wenk_2023	1	1	E. Wenk. “Unpublished data: Australian plant life history dataset, University of New South Wales, Sydney”. 2023.