Flora of North America species comparison

30-120 cm tall, 2-4 mm thick, erect or decumbent.

5-40 cm, erect or ascending.

usually densely, often retrorsely, hairy, hairs sometimes confined to the throat;

auricles absent;

ligules 1-4 mm, glabrous or pilose, obtuse, lacerate to erose;

blades 4-30 cm long, 3-10 mm wide, flat, glabrous or hairy on both surfaces.

glabrous or pubescent;

ligules 1.2-2.6 mm, puberulent, obtuse, laciniate;

blades 2-15 cm long, 2-5 mm wide, pubescent on both surfaces.

9-28 cm, usually open, erect or nodding;

lower branches shorter than 10 cm, 1-4 per node, spreading or ascending, with up to 5 spikelets variously distributed.

2-12 cm long, 1-5 cm wide, dense, ovoid, stiffly erect, sometimes racemose;

branches shorter than the spikelets, ascending, slightly curved or straight.

(17)20-40 mm, shorter than at least some pedicels and branches, elliptic to lanceolate, strongly laterally compressed, not crowded or overlapping, with 4-12 florets.

10-40(45) mm long, 4-10 mm wide, lanceolate to elliptic or oblong, laterally compressed;

florets 5-8(10), bases concealed at maturity;

rachilla internodes concealed at maturity.

smooth or scabrous, glabrous or pubescent;

lower glumes 7-12 mm, 5-7(9)-veined;

upper glumes 9-17 mm, 7-9(11)-veined, shorter than the lowest lemma;

lemmas 11-20 mm, lanceolate, laterally compressed, strongly keeled, usually glabrous, sometimes pubescent distally, smooth or scabrous, 9-13-veined, veins often raised and riblike, margins sometimes conspicuous, hyaline, whitish or partly purplish, apices entire or toothed, teeth acute, shorter than 1 mm;

awns absent or to 10 mm;

anthers 0.5-1 mm in cleistogamous florets, 2-5 mm in chasmogamous florets.

glabrous or pubescent;

lower glumes 5-8.5 mm, 3-5-veined, lanceolate;

upper glumes 6.5-9.5 mm, 7-9(11)-veined, elliptic;

lemmas 8-12(13.5) mm long, 6-7 mm wide, oblanceolate, veins glabrous, scabridulous, or ciliolate, glabrous or pubescent elsewhere, 9-11-veined, rounded over the midvein, margins broadly hyaline, bluntly angled above the middle, not inrolled at maturity, apices subulate to acute or obtuse, toothed, teeth shorter than 1 mm;

awns usually 3 on the upper lemmas in each spikelet, arising 2-4 mm below the lemma apices, purple or deep red, central awn 5-25 mm, flattened at the base, divaricate and sometimes twisted at maturity, lateral awns 4-10 mm, erect or reflexed, sometimes absent or much reduced on the lower lemmas;

anthers 1-1.8 mm.

equaling or shorter than the paleas, thin, weakly inrolled or flat.

= 42.

= 14.