Eragrostis mexicana |
Eragrostis swallenii |
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giant helleborine, Mexican love grass, Orcutt's lovegrass |
Swallen's lovegrass |
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Habit | Plants annual; cespitose, without innovations. | Plants perennial; cespitose, with innovations, without rhizomes. | ||||
Culms | 10-130 cm, erect, sometimes geniculate, glabrous, sometimes with a ring of glandular depressions below the nodes. |
35-70 cm, erect, with glandular bands 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. |
hairy on the margins and at the apices, hairs to 4 mm; ligules 0.2-0.5 mm; blades (8)10-25(30) cm long, 1.5-4 mm wide, flat to involute, abaxial surfaces glabrous, adaxial surfaces scabridulous, sometimes also sparsely hairy, hairs to 4 mm. |
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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. |
12-30 cm long, 5-16 cm wide, ovate, open, an oblique glandular ring present below the lowest rachis node; primary branches 2-10 cm, diverging 10-70° from the rachises, flexible; pulvini glabrous; pedicels 1.5-14 mm, divergent, with a glandular band. |
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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. |
5-16 mm long, 1.2-2.3 mm wide, linear-lanceolate, plumbeous to dark reddish-purple, with 5-25 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. |
ovate, membranous to hyaline; lower glumes 1.1-1.5 mm; upper glumes 1.4-2 mm; lemmas 1.5-2.5 mm, ovate, membranous, strongly keeled, keels without glands, lateral veins conspicuous, apices acute; paleas 1.2-2.1 mm, hyaline, narrower than the lemmas, apices obtuse to truncate; anthers 3, 0.3-0.5 mm, purplish. |
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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. |
0.8-1.1 mm, rectangular-prismatic to ellipsoid, somewhat laterally compressed, with a well-developed adaxial groove, smooth, faintly striate, mostly opaque, light reddish-brown. |
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2n | = 60. |
= 84. |
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Eragrostis mexicana |
Eragrostis swallenii |
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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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TX |
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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 swallenii grows in sandy sites along coastal grasslands and roadsides, often with Andropogon and Spartina, at 30-150 m. Its range extends around the Gulf coast from Texas to Mexico. (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. 93. | ||||
Parent taxa | Poaceae > subfam. Chloridoideae > tribe Cynodonteae > Eragrostis | Poaceae > subfam. Chloridoideae > tribe Cynodonteae > Eragrostis | ||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||
Name authority | (Hornem.) Link | Hitchc. | ||||
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