Eragrostis curvula |
Eragrostis airoides |
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weeping love grass |
darnel lovegrass |
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Habit | Plants perennial; cespitose, forming innovations at the basal nodes, without glands. | Plants perennial; cespitose, with innovations, without rhizomes, not glandular. |
Culms | (45)60-150 cm, erect, glabrous or glandular. |
30-110 cm, erect, glabrous below the nodes. |
Sheaths | with scattered hairs, hairs to 9 mm; ligules 0.6-1.3 mm; blades 12-50(65) cm long, 1-3 mm wide, flat to involute, abaxial surfaces glabrous, sometimes scabridulous, adaxial surfaces with scattered hairs basally, hairs to 7 mm. |
glabrous or pilose, hairs to 5 mm; ligules 0.1-0.2 mm; blades 8-22 mm long, (1)2-4(5) mm wide, flat to folded, glabrous abaxially, scabridulous adaxially. |
Panicles | 16-35(40) cm long, (4)8-24 cm wide, ovate to oblong, open; primary branches 3-14 cm, diverging 10-80° from the rachises; pulvini glabrous or not; pedicels 0.5-5 mm, appressed, flexible. |
18-70 cm long, 3-25 cm wide, diffuse, ovate; primary branches 4-20 cm, appressed or diverging 10-70° from the rachises, naked basally; pulvini glabrous; pedicels 2.4-11 mm, divergent. |
Spikelets | 4-8.2(10) mm long, 1.2-2 mm wide, linear-lanceolate, plumbeous to yellowish, with 3-10 florets; disarticulation irregular to acropetal, proximal rachilla segments persistent. |
1.3-2 mm long, 0.8-1.8 mm wide, ovate to lanceolate, plumbeous, with 1-3 florets; disarticulation acropetal, in the rachilla below the florets, glumes deciduous; rachilla prolonged above the terminal floret. |
Glumes | lanceolate, hyaline; lower glumes 1.2-2.6 mm; upper glumes 2-3 mm; lemmas 1.8-3 mm, ovate, membranous, lateral veins conspicuous, apices acute; paleas 1.8-3 mm, hyaline to membranous, apices obtuse; anthers 3, 0.6-1.2 mm, reddish-brown. |
lanceolate to ovate, membranous; lower glumes 0.8-1 mm; upper glumes 1.1-1.4 mm; lemmas 0.8-1.2 mm, ovate, membranous, plumbeous, keels and lateral veins inconspicuous, apices obtuse; paleas 0.8-1.2 mm, membranous, bases not projecting beyond the lemmas, apices obtuse; anthers 3, 0.3-0.5 mm, purplish. |
Caryopses | 1-1.7 mm, ellipsoid to obovoid, dorsally compressed, adaxial surfaces with a shallow, broad groove or ungrooved, smooth, mostly translucent, light brown, bases often greenish. |
0.4-0.5 mm, ovoid, reticulate, reddish-brown. |
Comm | .). |
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2n | = 40, 50. |
= 36 (Davidse, pers. |
Eragrostis curvula |
Eragrostis airoides |
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Distribution |
AL; AR; AZ; CA; CO; DE; FL; GA; IL; KS; KY; LA; MA; MD; MO; MS; NC; NJ; NM; NY; OH; OK; OR; PA; SC; TN; TX; UT; VA; WA; WV; HI; PR
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TX |
Discussion | Eragrostis curvula is native to southern Africa. It is often used for reclamation because it provides good ground cover but, once introduced, it easily escapes. In the Flora region, it grows on rocky slopes, at the margins of woods, along roadsides, and in waste ground, at 20-2400 m, usually in pine-oak woodlands, and yellow pine and mixed hardwood forests. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Eragrostis airoides is a South American species that, in the Flora region, is known only from roadsides and disturbed sites in Brazos County, Texas. It is an enigmatic species, often treated as Sporobolus brasiliensis (Raddi) Hack., which it resembles in its chromosome base number of x = 9 and caryopsis morphology, but its frequent possession of spikelets with more than 1 floret and its mode of spikelet disarticulation argue for its retention in Eragrostis. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 25, p. 76. | FNA vol. 25, p. 103. |
Parent taxa | Poaceae > subfam. Chloridoideae > tribe Cynodonteae > Eragrostis | Poaceae > subfam. Chloridoideae > tribe Cynodonteae > Eragrostis |
Sibling taxa | ||
Synonyms | E. curvula var. conferta, E. chloromelas | |
Name authority | (Schrad.) Nees | Nees |
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