Flora of North America species comparison

40-60 cm tall, 1.5-5 mm thick, erect.

usually hollow, sometimes solid.

scabridulous, not or weakly keeled;

ligules 1.5-4 mm;

blades 9-29 cm long, 2-7.5 mm wide, scabrous.

distichous;

sheaths usually open to the base, varying to closed for nearly their full length;

auricles present or absent;

abaxial ligules absent;

adaxial ligules scarious or membranous, sometimes puberulent or scabridulous, usually not ciliate, cilia sometimes shorter than the base;

pseudopetioles rarely present;

blades usually linear, sometimes broadly so, venation parallel;

cross sections non-Kranz, mesophyll nonradiate, adaxial palisade layer absent, fusoid and arm cells usually absent;

midribs usually simple;

adaxial bulliform cells present;

stomates with parallel-sided subsidiary cells;

epidermes usually lacking bicellular microhairs, sometimes with unicellular microhairs, papillae usually absent, when present, rarely more than 1 per cell.

15-25 cm long, 6-15(20) cm wide, open, pyramidal, nodding;

branches 8-12 cm, ascending to divergent, flexuous, often smooth, with 30-40+ spikelets;

pedicels 0.3-6 mm.

usually terminal, panicles, spikes, or racemes, usually ebracteate;

disarticulation usually below the florets, sometimes below the glumes, at the rachis nodes, or at the inflorescence bases.

3.5-6 mm long, 1.4-2.5 mm wide, about 2.5 times longer than wide, laterally compressed, oval in side view, with 3-6 florets.

usually bisexual, infrequently unisexual or mixed, usually laterally compressed or not compressed, occasionally dorsally compressed, with 1-30 sexual florets, distal floret(s) often reduced, infrequently spikelets with 1-2 reduced or staminate basal florets and a single terminal sexual floret.

unequal, lengths about 3 times widths, narrowing beyond midlength, veins terminating below the apices, apices acute, forming an angle of about 45°;

lower glumes 1.5-2 mm;

upper glumes 2-2.6 mm, erose;

rachilla internodes 0.4-0.6 mm;

lemmas 2.5-3.5 mm, oval in dorsal view, 7-veined, veins raised, scabridulous, apices broadly acute to obtuse, prow-shaped;

paleas from shorter than to equaling the lemmas, lengths 3-3.5 times widths, keels not winged, tips incurved, apices narrowly notched between the keels;

anthers 2, 0.5-0.9 mm.

usually 2, upper or lower glumes sometimes absent, rarely both glumes absent;

lemmas without uncinate hairs, awned or not, awns single, basal to apical;

paleas usually well-developed, sometimes reduced or absent;

lodicules 2(3), usually lanceolate and broadly membranous distally, rarely truncate and fleshy, usually not veined or obscurely veined, sometimes distinctly veined, sometimes ciliate;

anthers (1, 2)3;

ovaries glabrous or sometimes hairy distally, sometimes with an apical appendage;

haustorial synergids absent;

styles (1)2 (-4), bases close together, sometimes fused.

about 1 mm.

hila linear, elliptic, ovate, or punctate;

endosperm usually hard, sometimes soft or liquid, with or without lipids, starch grains compound or simple;

embryos less than 1/2 the length of the caryopses;

epiblasts usually present;

scutellar cleft usually absent;

mesocotyl internode usually absent;

embryonic leaf margins overlapping, x = 7, 10.

= unknown.