The green links below add additional plants to the comparison table. Blue links lead to other Web sites.
enable glossary links

aristide à rameaux basilaires, fork three-awn, fork-tip threeawn

Habit Plants annual.
Culms

25-45 cm, erect, branching at most nodes.

Leaves

cauline;

sheaths shorter than the internodes, glabrous or sparsely pilose;

ligules about 0.3 mm;

blades 3-8 cm long, 1-1.5 mm wide, flat to folded, becoming involute in age, adaxial surfaces with scattered pilose hairs, pale green.

Inflorescences

racemose or paniculate, (2)4-10 cm long, 1-2 cm wide, with few (sometimes only 1 or 2) spikelets;

primary branches weakly developed, to 2 cm, appressed, with 1-3 spikelets.

Spikelets

appressed, only slightly overlapping.

Glumes

1-veined, acute, awned, awns 1-2 mm, brown to purplish;

upper glumes 10-12 mm;

lower glumes 1-2 mm shorter;

calluses 0.4-0.6 mm;

lemmas 8-9 mm, light gray, mottled;

awns erect to divergent;

central awns 10-15 mm, with 2-3 spiral coils at the base;

lateral awns 5-10 mm, not coiled but often curved and twisted basally, strongly divergent distally;

anthers 3, about 3 mm, purplish-brown.

Caryopses

6-7 mm, light chestnut brown.

2n

= unknown.

Aristida mobrii

Aristida basiramea

Distribution
from FNA
AL; CO; FL; IA; IL; IN; KS; MA; ME; MI; MN; MO; MS; ND; NE; NH; NY; OK; PA; SC; TN; TX; VT; WI; WV; ON; QC
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Aristida basiramea grows in open, sandy, often barren ground in southern Ontario and in the United States. It is similar to A. dichototna, differing in its longer lateral awns. Further study may show that the two should be treated as conspecific varieties.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Source FNA vol. 25, p. 326.
Parent taxa Poaceae > subfam. Aristidoideae > tribe Aristideae > Aristida
Sibling taxa
A. adscensionis, A. arizonica, A. basiramea, A. californica, A. condensata, A. desmantha, A. dichotoma, A. divaricata, A. floridana, A. gypsophila, A. gyrans, A. havardii, A. lanosa, A. longespica, A. mohrii, A. oligantha, A. palustris, A. pansa, A. patula, A. purpurascens, A. purpurea, A. ramosissima, A. rhizomophora, A. schiedeana, A. simpliciflora, A. spiciformis, A. stricta, A. ternipes, A. tuberculosa
A. adscensionis, A. arizonica, A. californica, A. condensata, A. desmantha, A. dichotoma, A. divaricata, A. floridana, A. gypsophila, A. gyrans, A. havardii, A. lanosa, A. longespica, A. mohrii, A. oligantha, A. palustris, A. pansa, A. patula, A. purpurascens, A. purpurea, A. ramosissima, A. rhizomophora, A. schiedeana, A. simpliciflora, A. spiciformis, A. stricta, A. ternipes, A. tuberculosa
Name authority Engelm. ex Vasey
Web links