Eragrostis mexicana |
Eragrostis curvula |
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giant helleborine, Mexican love grass, Orcutt's lovegrass |
weeping love grass |
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Habit | Plants annual; cespitose, without innovations. | Plants perennial; cespitose, forming innovations at the basal nodes, without glands. | ||||
Culms | 10-130 cm, erect, sometimes geniculate, glabrous, sometimes with a ring of glandular depressions below the nodes. |
(45)60-150 cm, erect, glabrous or glandular. |
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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. |
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. |
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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. |
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. |
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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. |
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. |
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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. |
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. |
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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. |
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. |
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2n | = 60. |
= 40, 50. |
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Eragrostis mexicana |
Eragrostis curvula |
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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; 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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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 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.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 25, p. 78. | FNA vol. 25, p. 76. | ||||
Parent taxa | ||||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||
Synonyms | E. curvula var. conferta, E. chloromelas | |||||
Name authority | (Hornem.) Link | (Schrad.) Nees | ||||
Web links |
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