Flora of North America species comparison

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

30-70 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.

often densely hairy with soft, white hairs;

ligules 1-2 mm, hairy, obtuse, erose;

blades 10-30 cm long, 3-5 mm wide, glabrous or pubescent.

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.

5-15 cm long, 2-9 cm wide, erect, densely contracted when immature, more open with age;

branches usually shorter than the spikelets, rigid, ascending to slightly spreading, 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.

20-50 mm, lanceolate, terete to moderately laterally compressed, often 2+ per node;

florets 7-20, 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.

pilose;

lower glumes 5-9 mm, 3-5-veined: upper glumes 8-12 mm, 5-7-veined;

lemmas 11-20 mm long, 1.8-2.5 mm wide, lanceolate, pilose, obscurely 7-veined, rounded over the midvein, margins rounded, not inrolled at maturity, apices acute, bifid, teeth shorter than 1 mm;

awns 6-12 mm, to 20 mm on some distal lemmas, divaricate when mature, arising 1.5 mm or more below the lemma apices;

anthers 1-1.5 mm.

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

= 42.

= 28, 42.