Muhlenbergia richardsonis |
Muhlenbergia texana |
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mat muhly, Matted muhly, muhlenbergie de Richardson, Richardson's muhly, soft-leaf muhly |
Texas muhly |
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Habit | Plants perennial; rhizomatous, not cespitose, often mat-forming. | Plants annual; slender. |
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. |
10-35 cm, erect; internodes strigulose. |
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. |
shorter or longer than the internodes, strigulose; ligules 0.9-2.5 mm, hyaline, acute to obtuse, irregularly toothed to lacerate; blades 1-6(8) cm long, 0.8-2 mm wide, flat or involute, scabrous and sparsely strigulose on both surfaces. |
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. |
9-21 cm long, 2-7 cm wide; primary branches 12-60 mm, occasionally capillary, narrowly ascending or diverging up to 70° from the rachises; pedicels 2-7 mm, usually longer than the florets, straight to somewhat curved, rarely bent as much as 90°; disarticulation above the glumes. |
Spikelets | 1.7-3.1 mm, occasionally with 2 florets. |
1.3-2 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. |
sparsely strigulose, particularly on the margins, 1-veined, acute to acuminate; lower glumes 0.8-1.2 mm; upper glumes 0.9-1.5 mm, bases slightly wider than the lower glumes; lemmas 1.3-2 mm, lanceolate, purplish to brown, shortly appressed-pubescent on the lower 1/2 of the midveins and margins, apices acute to acuminate, awned, awns 0.1-1(2) mm; paleas 1.3-2 mm, oblong-elliptic, minutely appressed-pubescent on the lower 1/2, apices acute; anthers 0.4-0.5 mm, purplish. |
Caryopses | 0.9-1.6 mm, narrowly ellipsoid, brown. |
0.8-1 mm, fusiform, brownish. |
2n | = 40. |
= 40. |
Muhlenbergia richardsonis |
Muhlenbergia texana |
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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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AZ; NM; 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 texana grows on open slopes, in sandy, gravelly drainages, and on rock outcrops, at elevations of 1200-2750 m. Its range extends from the southwestern United States into northwestern Mexico. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 25, p. 177. | FNA vol. 25, p. 198. |
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. | Buckley |
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