Muhlenbergia richardsonis |
Muhlenbergia crispiseta |
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mat muhly, Matted muhly, muhlenbergie de Richardson, Richardson's muhly, soft-leaf muhly |
Mexicali muhly |
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Habit | Plants perennial; rhizomatous, not cespitose, often mat-forming. | Plants annual; tufted. |
Culms | 5-30 cm tall, 0.4-1 mm thick, decumbent, geniculate, or erect; internodes usually nodulose (occasionally smooth) for most of their length, puberulent or nodulose below the nodes. |
7-16 cm. |
Sheaths | shorter or longer than the internodes, glabrous; ligules 0.8-3 mm, membranous, acute to truncate, erose; blades 0.4-6.5 cm long, 0.5-4.2 mm wide, flat or involute, straight or arcuate-spreading, glabrous abaxially, hirtellous adaxially. |
longer than the internodes, scabridulous or smooth, margins membranous; ligules 1.3-2 mm, membranous, rounded; blades 1-5 cm long, 0.7-1.4 mm wide, flat or involute, scabridulous or smooth abaxially, shortly pubescent adaxially. |
Panicles | 1-15 cm long, 0.1-1.7 cm wide, exserted, narrow or spikelike, rachises usually concealed by the branches; primary branches 0.4-5 cm, usually closely appressed at maturity, rarely diverging up to 20° from the rachises; pedicels 0.2-2 mm, setulose. |
1.8-4.5 cm long, 1.5-3 cm wide, long-exserted; primary branches 1.5-2.8 cm, ascending; pedicels 0.4-2 mm, often curved, scabrous. |
Spikelets | 1.7-3.1 mm, occasionally with 2 florets. |
1.7-2.2 mm. |
Glumes | subequal, 0.6-2 mm, 1/3– 1/2 as long as the lemmas, green, 1(2)-veined, acute, sometimes mucronate, mucros less than 0.2 mm; lemmas 1.7-2.6(3.1) mm, lanceolate, dark greenish, plumbeous, or mottled, glabrous, apices scabridulous, acute to acuminate, sometimes mucronate, mucros to 0.5 mm; paleas 1.2-2.4(2.9) mm, lanceolate, acute; anthers 0.9-1.6 mm, yellow to purplish. |
whitish, mostly smooth, scabrous on the veins; lower glumes 1.2-1.6 mm, 1-veined, acute; upper glumes 1.6-1.8 mm, wider than the lower glumes, 2- or 3-veined, truncate, 2- or 3-toothed; lemmas 1.7-2.2 mm, lanceolate, widest near the middle, whitish with dark green patches, densely hairy on the calluses and lower portion of the lemma bodies, hairs to 0.5 mm, apices glabrous, acuminate, minutely bifid, awned, awns 8-18 mm, sinuous to crisped or curled, olive-green; paleas 1.1-1.7 mm, lanceolate, intercostal region loosely pilose on the proximal 2/3, apices acuminate; anthers 0.4-0.7 mm, purplish-red. |
Caryopses | 0.9-1.6 mm, narrowly ellipsoid, brown. |
0.5-1.1 mm, ellipsoid, brownish. |
2n | = 40. |
= 20. |
Muhlenbergia richardsonis |
Muhlenbergia crispiseta |
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Distribution |
AK; AZ; CA; CO; ID; ME; MI; MN; MT; ND; NE; NM; NV; OR; SD; UT; WA; WI; WY; AB; BC; MB; NB; NT; ON; QC; SK; YT
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TX |
Discussion | Muhlenbergia richardsonis grows in open sites in alkaline meadows, prairies, sandy arroyo bottoms, talus slopes, rocky flats and the shores of rivers, at elevations of 60-3300 m. It is the most widespread species of Muhlenbergia in the Flora region, extending from the Yukon Territory to Quebec in the north and to northern Baja California, Mexico, in the south. Morden and Hatch (1996) reported that it also grows in Alaska, but no voucher specimen has been located. Muhlenbergia richardsonis is often confused with M. cuspidata, which differs in lacking rhizomes and having shorter ligules, and sometimes with M. filiformis, which differs in being a weak annual with glabrous internodes and obtuse, erose glumes. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Muhlenbergia crispiseta grows on rock outcrops, in rocky drainages, and on white tablelands, on soils derived from calcareous parent materials in pine-oak and pinyon-juniper woodlands, at elevations of 1900-2600 m. It is basically a Mexican species, with a disjunct population in Brewster County, Texas. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 25, p. 177. | FNA vol. 25, p. 185. |
Parent taxa | Poaceae > subfam. Chloridoideae > tribe Cynodonteae > Muhlenbergia | Poaceae > subfam. Chloridoideae > tribe Cynodonteae > Muhlenbergia |
Sibling taxa | ||
Synonyms | Sporobolus depauperatus, M. squarrosa | |
Name authority | (Trin.) Rydb. | Hitchc. |
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