Flora of North America species comparison

15-50 cm, slender, wiry;

internodes olive green to purplish, densely puberulent or glabrous;

fall phase spreading or decumbent, branching extensively from the lower and midculm nodes, producing numerous congested fascicles of reduced, flat or involute blades and reduced secondary panicles.

15-55 cm tall, 0.2-0.8 mm thick, erect from geniculate bases;

nodes glabrous;

internodes mostly glabrous, or the lowest internodes sparsely appressed-pubescent basally;

fall phase branching sparingly from the lower and midculm nodes.

4-7;

sheaths much shorter than the internodes, densely crisp-puberulent, velvety-puberulent, or glabrous, often ciliate along the margins;

ligules shorter than 0.5 mm;

blades 2-7 cm long (seldom longer), 2.5-8 mm wide (rarely wider), spreading, firm, flat or slightly involute, without prominently raised veins, not longitudinally wrinkled, densely puberulent or glabrous abaxially, glabrous, sparsely puberulent, or pubescent adaxially, bases subcordate, with papillose-based cilia, margins often whitish and scabridulous.

3-4;

sheaths much shorter than the internodes, prominently veined, mostly glabrous, margins occasionally ciliate, ligules 0.2-0.7 mm, of hairs, without adjacent pseudoligules;

blades 2-6 cm long, 1.5-6 mm wide, ascending, distant, flat, relatively thick, glabrous on both surfaces or the abaxial surfaces minutely puberulent, bases rounded, margins more or less prominently whitish-scabridulous, blades of the flag leaves much shorter than those of the lower leaves.

1.5-2.6 mm, obovoid-pyriform, planoconvex in side view, puberulent, pubescent, or glabrous, attenuate basally, apices usually broadly rounded.

1.3-1.7 mm long, less than 1 mm wide, ellipsoid, often purplish, densely puberulent, obtuse or subacute.

0.6-1.4 mm, thin, weakly-veined, attached about 0.2 mm below the upper glumes, clasping at the base;

upper glumes as long as or slightly shorter than the lower lemmas;

upper florets 1.4-2 mm, broadly ellipsoid, apices subacute, minutely puberulent.

usually less than 1/4 as long as the spikelets, broadly acute or obtuse;

upper glumes and lower lemmas subequal, or the glumes slightly shorter, exceeded by the upper florets;

lower florets sterile;

upper florets 1.3-1.6 mm, ellipsoid, subacute.

rosettes well-differentiated;

blades 1.5-6 cm, ovate to lanceolate.

rosettes well-differentiated;

blades 1-5 cm, ovate to lanceolate.

panicles 2-7 cm long, 2/3 to nearly as wide as long, with relatively few spikelets, exserted;

branches flexuous, spreading or reflexed, scabridulous to densely puberulent.

panicles 3-6 cm, nearly as wide as long, long-exserted, dense;

branches wiry, spreading to ascending, usually scabridulous.

= 18.

= 18.