Evaluation of Five Ornamental Grasses from Pennisetum Rich. Grown in Beijing

Field experiments conducted in Beijing to evaluate growth,overwintering,root distribution and propagation of 5 Pennisetum plants-Pennisetum alopecuroides(L.) Spreng’Ziguang’,Pennisetum setaceum(Forssk.) Chiov.,Pennisetum villosum R.Br.ex Fresen,Pennisetum alopecuroides Desv.ex Ham’Little Bunny’and Pennisetum orientale.Willd.ex Rich.All of the 5 species grown in Beijing region could germinate,well grow,bloom and produce seeds.P.alopecuroides’Ziguang’and P.setaceum grew up to 135 cm and 156 cm of inflorescences height,with 156 and 217 shoots per plant,and with 608.7 and 535.3 g/plant shoot dry biomass,respectively.Their root system mainly distributed from 10-40 cm to soil surface and 0-30 cm to the stem.Compare to above two,P.alopecuroides’Little Bunny’and P.orientale were relatively shorter,the maximum inflorescences height of them were 40 cm,with 162 and 108 shoots per plant and with 124.2 and 39.8 g/plant shoot dry biomass,respectively.While P.villosum with horizontal stems were 79 cm of foliage height,but with up to 389 shoots per plant,and the shoot dry biomass was 619.9 g/plant.Its root system mainly distributed 0-30 cm to soil surface and 0-30 cm to stem.Among all of them P.alopecuroides’Ziguang’,P.alopecuroides’Little Bunny’and P.orientale overwintering survival were 100%,while the overwintering survival of P.setaceum and P.villosum were 0% which indicate these two species could only be planted as annual plant.Moreover,results showed that all of them could be propagated both by sowing and division.