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.

15-35 cm, stiffly erect, all but the upper 2-4 internodes very short;

nodes glabrous or with weak, reflexed hairs;

internodes purplish-gray, sparsely pubescent;

fall phase developing early, forming erect branches from the lower or midculm nodes, each branch terminating in a partially included panicle of 8-16 spikelets, no sterile shoots formed.

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.

usually 3;

sheaths hirsute, hairs papillose-based;

ligules 0.5-1 mm;

blades 4-8 cm long, 2-5 mm wide, all alike, stiffly erect, green to grayish-green, flat, not plicate, sparsely pilose.

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

2.4-3.2 mm long, 0.7-1.2 mm wide, ellipsoid to obovoid, often reddish throughout, short-pubescent.

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.

0.7-1.2 mm, triangular;

upper glumes and lower lemmas about equaling the upper florets;

upper florets 1.9-2.5 mm, ellipsoid, pointed.

rosettes well-differentiated;

blades 1.5-6 cm, ovate to lanceolate.

rosettes poorly differentiated;

sheaths glabrous;

blades 2-4 cm, narrow, similar to those of the lower cauline leaves, ascending to spreading.

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 3-5 cm long, 2-4 cm wide, ovoid, open, shortly exserted, with 12-32 spikelets;

branches short, stiff, spreading;

pedicels mostly 4-8 mm, spreading.

= 18.

= 18.