India sandbur

Cenchrus biflorus, the Indian sandbur or West African cram-cram, is a tufted annual grass in the family Poaceae, widely distributed through the semi-arid regions of Africa from the Sahel south to South Africa and across the Middle East and South Asia to north-western India, where it occupies sandy soils of overgrazed pastures, dunes, fallow fields, and roadsides. Plants form open tufts with geniculate-ascending culms 30-100 cm tall, often branching at the lower nodes. The leaf blades are flat to loosely folded, 5-30 cm long and 2-7 mm wide, sparsely hairy or glabrous, with a ciliate membranous ligule and rough margins. The inflorescence is a terminal cylindrical spike-like raceme 3-10 cm long bearing 8-25 globose burs; each bur is 4-6 mm in diameter and consists of a fused involucre of flattened, retrorsely barbed bristles surrounding (usually) two spikelets — the basis of the epithet biflorus. The burs detach readily and adhere fiercely to skin, clothing, and animal coats, causing painful injuries and acting as effective seed-dispersers. Despite being a major nuisance weed, the seeds are gathered as a famine grain in the Sahel.