Elymus stebbinsii
Elymus villosus
Parish wheatgrass, Stebbins' wheat grass, Stebbins' wildrye
downy wild-rye, hairy wildrye, silky wild rye
60-140 cm;
nodes glabrous or retrorsely pubescent.
40-130 cm, erect;
nodes 4-8, concealed or exposed, glabrous.
evenly distributed;
sheaths glabrous or pubescent;
auricles usually present, 0.5-2 mm;
ligules 0.3-3.5 mm, truncate to acute, sometimes long-ciliate;
blades 4-6.5 mm wide, flat or the margins involute, straight.
evenly distributed;
sheaths villous-hirsute, pilose, or occasionally glabrate, occasionally reddish brown;
auricles 1-3 mm, brownish;
ligules shorter than 1 mm, entire or erose;
blades 4-12 mm wide, lax, dark glossy green, adaxial surfaces usually densely velutinous-villous with fine whitish hairs, rarely pilose only on the veins.
15-31 cm long, 0.4-1.5 cm wide including the awns, 0.4-0.8 cm wide excluding the awns, erect, with 1 spikelet per node;
internodes 9-27 mm long, 1-1.3 mm wide, glabrous, smooth.
4-12 cm long, 1.5-3.5 cm wide, slightly or strongly nodding, exserted, usually with 2 spikelets per node, rarely with 1 or 3 at a few nodes;
internodes (1.5)2-3(4) mm long, 0.15-0.25 mm thick at the thinnest sections, usually hairy below the spikelets, rarely glabrous.
13-29 mm long, from shorter than to almost twice as long as the internodes, 2.5-5 mm wide, appressed, with 5-7 florets;
rachillas glabrous;
disarticulation above the glumes and beneath each floret.
7-12 mm, moderately divergent, with 1-2(3) florets, lowest florets functional;
disarticulation above the glumes and beneath each floret.
subequal, 7.5-12 mm long, 1.2-1.5 mm wide, lanceolate, widest at about mid-length, flat or rounded on the back, 5-veined, veins smooth, scabrous or just the midvein scabridulous, margins widest at about midlength, apices acute, unawned;
lemmas 9-12 mm, glabrous, sometimes scabrous, acute, unawned or awned, awns to 28 mm, straight;
paleas subequal to the lemmas, tapering, apices 0.2-0.3 mm wide;
anthers (3.5)4-7 mm.
equal, 12-25 mm including the often undifferentiated awns, the basal 0.5-2 mm terete, slightly indurate, straight or nearly so, without evident venation, glume bodies 7-10 mm long, (0.2)0.3-0.8 mm wide, linear-setiform, widening or parallel-sided above the base, 2-3(4)-veined, usually hirsute to hispid, occasionally scabrous to scabridulous, margins firm, awns 5-15 mm, straight;
lemmas 5.5-9 mm, usually villous with fine, whitish, spreading hairs, especially near the margins and apices, sometimes glabrous or with coarser hairs, sometimes scabrous, awns 9-33 mm, straight;
paleas 5-7.5 mm, obtuse, occasionally emarginate;
anthers (1.6)2-3(4) mm.
early June to early July.
= 28.
= 28.
Elymus stebbinsii
Elymus villosus
Elymus stebbinsii is restricted to California, where it grows on dry slopes, chaparral, and wooded areas, at elevations below 1600 m. It differs from other Elymus species primarily in its combination of long anthers and solitary spikelets. It is often confused with E. glaucus (p. 306) and E. trachycaulus (p. 321) with solitary spikelets. It differs from both in its longer anthers, and from most representatives of E. glaucus in its acute, but unawned, glumes.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Elymus villosus grows in moist to moderately dry, often rocky soils in woods and thickets, especially in calcareous or other base-rich soils, but it is also frequent on drier, sandy soils or damper, alluvial soils in glaciated regions. It extends from the Great Plains east to southern Quebec, northern New York, and Vermont south to Texas, Georgia, and South Carolina. It is absent from the southern portion of the coastal plain.
Elymus villosus is relatively uniform and distinct, although it has sometimes been confused with hairy plants of E. canadensis (p. 303) and E. glabriflorus (p. 296). The hairs of E. villosus are fine, whitish, and consistently dense on the leaf blades, typically spreading in the spikelets; the hairs of the other species are typically stouter and more appressed in the spikelets. Plants called E. villosus var. arkansanas (Scribn. & C.R. Ball) J.J.N. Campb. are scabrous to glabrous in the spikes, except for the ciliate rachis margins, and often more robust. These are scattered over much of the species' range, except in the north (from Wisconsin to New England), and are locally more frequent than typical plants in the Ozark Mountains and other midwestern hills. Some other western plants (including those called E. striatus var. ballii Pammel) have unusually large, almost erect spikes, suggesting introgression from E. virginicus (p. 298). There are rare apparent hybrids with species in the E. virginicus group, but the only proven natural hybrid is with Hordeum fubatum (p. 245) (see *Elyhordeum, p. 283). Artificial crosses with several species failed to produce healthy Fj plants (Church 1958).
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
1. Lemmas awned, awns 8-28 mm long; lower leaf sheaths rarely pubescent; spikelets 13-22 mm long | subsp. septentrionalis |
1. Lemmas unawned or with awns to 8(12) mm long; lower leaf sheaths pubescent or glabrous; spikelets 17-29 mm long | subsp. stebbinsii |
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