Gymnopogon ambiguus
Gymnopogon chapmanianus
bearded skeletongrass, eastern beardgrass
Chapman's skeletongrass
20-100 cm, suberect to spreading, stiff, simple to sparingly branched.
20-70 cm, erect to sprawling, simple or sparingly branched from the lower nodes.
mostly glabrous, throats sometimes pubescent;
collars conspicuously pubescent;
ligules about 0.2 mm;
blades (1.5)2.5-12 cm long, (2)5-10(18) mm wide, somewhat cordate at the base, mostly glabrous, often pubescent near the basal margins.
glabrous;
ligules 0.1-0.3 mm;
blades 1.3-8.5 cm long, 2-8 mm wide, glabrous.
(6)11.5-30(35) cm;
branches (3)7-24 cm, stiffly spreading to somewhat reflexed, spikelet-bearing from the base, spikelets remote to slightly imbricate.
8-23.5 cm;
branches 2-15 cm, ascending, widely spreading, or reflexed, spikelet-bearing from the base or naked for less than 1/3 of their length.
with 1(2) florets.
with (1)2-3(4) florets.
4-7 mm;
calluses bearded;
bisexual lemmas 2.5-5(6) mm, awns 4-12.2 mm;
second florets often reduced to an obliquely inserted 2.4-6.2 mm awn;
anthers 3, 0.8-1.2 mm.
to 6 mm, sometimes widely divergent;
lemmas of bisexual florets 1.5-2.3 mm, unawned or awned, awns 0.7-2.2 mm;
terminal sterile florets minute, rudimentary, awned, awns not exserted from the spikelets;
anthers 3, 0.5-0.8 mm.
2-3 mm long, 0.2-0.5 mm wide.
1.2-1.5 mm long, 0.3-0.4 mm wide.
= 40.
= unknown.
Gymnopogon ambiguus
Gymnopogon chapmanianus
Gymnopogon ambiguus grows in sandy pine woodlands of the southeastern United States, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic. It often grows with G. brevifolius, from which it differs in being more robust, having long, wider leaves, longer lemma awns, and, usually, having panicle branches that are spikelet-bearing to the base. Although spikelets of Gymnopogon ambiguus usually have only one floret, several plants from Texas have been found in which two florets per spikelet were the norm.
There is an 1853 collection of G. ambiguus supposedly from Dona Ana County, New Mexico, but there have been no recent collections from anywhere near there; it is possible that the locality data on the label are incorrect.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Gymnopogon chapmanianus grows in sandy pine barrens and sites inhabited by dwarf palmetto, Serenoa repens. As interpreted here, G. chapmanianus includes G. floridanus Swallen. Smith (1971) treated the two as distinct species, but he acknowledged that they overlapped morphologically, ecologically, and geographically. Subsequent fieldwork has not supported the recognition of two entities. Smith's most intriguing observation was that only plants fitting the G. floridanus end of the morphological range produced mature caryopses. The reproductive biology of G. chapmanianus merits examination.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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