Fimbristylis vahlii |
Fimbristylis cymosa |
|
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Vahl's fimbristylis, Vahl's fimbry |
hurricanegrass |
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Habit | Plants annual, cespitose, delicate, 4–15 cm, bases soft; rhizomes absent. | Plants perennial, cespitose, (5–)10–60 cm, bases hard, glabrous; rhizomes absent. |
Leaves | polystichous, mostly spreading or excurved, often exceeding culms; sheaths entire, abaxially smooth or sparsely hirtellous; ligule absent; blades filiform, to 0.5 mm wide, somewhat involute, abaxially glabrous or ascending-strigillose. |
polystichous, mostly spreading-excurved, to 1/2 as long as culms; sheaths usually entire; ligule absent; blades linear, 2–3 mm wide, flat or shallowly involute, margin scabrid, apex blunt. |
Inflorescences | terminal; spikelets sessile or subsessile in single capitate leafy-involucrate cluster; scapes filiform; involucral bracts leafy, setaceous, greatly overtopping inflorescence. |
simple or compound anthelae with numerous small pedunculate clusters of sessile spikelets; scapes linear, distally terete, 1–2 mm thick; involucral bracts short, usually shorter than inflorescence. |
Spikelets | greenish, cylindric to lanceoloid-cylindric, 5–10 mm; fertile scales narrowly ovate to lanceolate, 1–1.5 mm, acute, glabrous, midrib strong, excurrent as cusp. |
greenish brown or yellow-brown, ovoid, 2–3 mm; fertile scales broadly ovate, 1–1.5 mm, obtuse or apically notched, midrib not excurrent. |
Flowers | stamens 1; styles 2-fid, slender, bulbous-based, smooth or papillate. |
stamens usually 1; styles 2-fid, slender, glabrous. |
Achenes | pale, tumidly obovoid, 0.5–0.7 mm, cancellate, pits horizontally rectangular in 5–7 vertical rows per side. |
dark brown to nearly black, tumidly obovoid, rarely obscurely 3-ribbed, 1 mm, faintly striate to variously warty, faintly reticulate. |
2n | = 20. |
= 56. |
Fimbristylis vahlii |
Fimbristylis cymosa |
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Phenology | Fruiting summer–fall. | Fruiting all year. |
Habitat | Moist to wet, alluvial or mineralized banks, shores, fluctuating pond and lake edges, often a “drawdown” plant around stock tanks and reservoirs | Sands of sea beaches, brackish sandy open sites, often disturbed, commonly just in from mangrove or on sandy road shoulders |
Elevation | 0–500 m (0–1600 ft) | 0–50 m (0–200 ft) |
Distribution |
AL; AR; AZ; CA; FL; GA; IL; KS; KY; LA; MO; MS; NE; OK; SC; TN; TX; Mexico; Central America; South America
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FL; s Mexico; Central America; South America; Africa; Asia; Indian Ocean Islands; Pacific Islands; Australia |
Discussion | New World examples of Fimbristylis cymosa are almost exclusively bicarpellate, with bifid styles; Old World Oceania examples are tricarpellate, with trifid styles, a form not covered in this treatment. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Source | FNA vol. 23, p. 127. | FNA vol. 23, p. 128. |
Parent taxa | Cyperaceae > Fimbristylis | Cyperaceae > Fimbristylis |
Sibling taxa | ||
Synonyms | Scirpus vahlii, F. apus, F. congesta, F. vincentii, Isolepis vahlii, Scirpus apus | F. melanospora, F. obtusifolia, F. sintenisii, F. spathacea, Scirpus obtusifolius |
Name authority | (Lamarck) Link: Hort. Berol. 1: 287. (1827) | R. Brown: Prodr., 228. (1810) |
Web links |