Eragrostis mexicana |
Eragrostis capillaris |
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giant helleborine, Mexican love grass, Orcutt's lovegrass |
lace grass, lace lovegrass |
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Habit | Plants annual; cespitose, without innovations. | Plants annual; tufted, without innovations, without glands. | ||||
Culms | 10-130 cm, erect, sometimes geniculate, glabrous, sometimes with a ring of glandular depressions below the nodes. |
(15)20-50(60) cm, erect, glabrous, often shiny below the nodes. |
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Sheaths | sometimes with glandular pits, pilose near the apices and on the collars, hairs to 4 mm, papillose-based; ligules 0.2-0.5 mm, ciliate; blades 5-25 cm long, 2-7(9) mm wide, flat, abaxial surfaces glabrous, adaxial surfaces scabridulous, occasionally pubescent near the base. |
pilose along the margins, apices hirsute, hairs to 7 mm; ligules 0.2-0.5 mm, ciliate; blades (6)8-20(30) cm long, (1)2-5 mm wide, flat, abaxial surfaces smooth, glabrous, adaxial surfaces scabridulous, with long scattered hairs. |
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Panicles | (5)10-40 cm long, (2)4-18 cm wide, ovate, rachises angled and channeled; primary branches 3-12(15) cm, solitary to whorled, appressed or diverging to 80° from the rachises; secondary branches somewhat appressed; pulvini glabrous; pedicels 1-6(7) mm, almost appressed to narrowly divergent, stiff. |
(10)15-45(55) cm long, (7)10-25 cm wide, to 2/3 the height of the plants, elliptic to ovate, open, rachises without glandular pits; primary branches (2)5-15 cm, diverging 20-90° from the rachises, capillary, naked basally; pulvini glabrous; pedicels (4)5-25 mm, divergent, scabridulous. |
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Spikelets | (4)5-10(11) mm long, 0.7-2.4 mm wide, ovate to linear-lanceolate, gray-green to purplish, with 5-11(15) florets; disarticulation acropetal. |
(1.4)2-5 mm long, 1-1.3(1.4) mm wide, ovate to lanceolate, plumbeous, occasionally reddish-purple, with 2-5(7) florets; disarticulation acropetal, paleas persistent. |
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Glumes | subequal, 0.7-2(2.3) mm, ovate to lanceolate, membranous; lemmas 1.2-2.4 mm, ovate, membranous, glabrous or with a few hairs, gray-green, lateral veins evident, often greenish, apices acute; paleas 1-2.2 mm, hyaline, keels scabrous, apices obtuse to truncate; anthers 3, 0.2-0.5 mm, purplish. |
narrowly lanceolate to lanceolate, hyaline; lower glumes 1-1.2 mm, narrower than the upper glumes; upper glumes 1.2-1.4 mm; lemmas 1.2-1.7 mm, broadly ovate, membranous, keels scabridulous, lateral veins inconspicuous, apices acute; paleas 1.2-1.6 mm, hyaline, keels almost smooth to scabrous, scabridities to 0.1 mm, apices acute to obtuse; anthers 3, 0.2-0.3 mm, reddish-brown. |
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Caryopses | 0.5-0.8(1) mm, ovoid to rectangular-prismatic, laterally compressed, shallowly to deeply grooved on the adaxial surface, striate, reddish-brown, distal 2/3 opaque. |
0.4-0.7 mm, ovoid to rectangular-prismatic, adaxial surfaces deeply grooved, striate, bases reddish-brown, distal 2/3 opaque. |
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2n | = 60. |
= 50, 100. |
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Eragrostis mexicana |
Eragrostis capillaris |
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Distribution |
AZ; CA; CO; DE; FL; IA; ID; IL; IN; MA; MD; ME; ND; NM; NV; OR; SC; TX; UT; WA; WI; BC; ON
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AL; AR; CA; CT; DC; DE; FL; GA; IA; IL; IN; KS; KY; LA; MA; MD; ME; MI; MO; MS; NC; NE; NH; NJ; NY; OH; OK; PA; RI; SC; TN; TX; VA; VT; WI; WV; ON; QC
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Discussion | Eragrostis mexicana grows along roadsides, near cultivated fields, and in disturbed open areas, at 100-3000 m. It is native to the Americas, its native range extending from the southwestern United States through Mexico, Central and northern South America, to Argentina. Within the Flora region, it has been introduced beyond its native range, often becoming an established part of the flora. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Eragrostis capillaris is native to the eastern portion of the Flora region. It grows in open, dry, sandy river-banks, floodplains, rocky roadsides, and gravel pits, at 150-1500 m, usually in association with Pinus, Quercus, Carrya, and Liquidambar styraciflua. Its range extends into northeastern Mexico. Eragrostis capillaris resembles E. frankii, but differs in its lack of glandular pits, deeply grooved caryopses, longer pedicels, pilose sheath margins, and larger panicles. The two species are sympatric over much of the eastern United States. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 25, p. 78. | FNA vol. 25, p. 79. | ||||
Parent taxa | Poaceae > subfam. Chloridoideae > tribe Cynodonteae > Eragrostis | Poaceae > subfam. Chloridoideae > tribe Cynodonteae > Eragrostis | ||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||
Name authority | (Hornem.) Link | (L.) Nees | ||||
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