Flora of North America species comparison

30-130 cm, terete to slightly compressed.

50-200 cm, strongly compressed, decumbent-erect, glaucous;

nodes glabrous.

laterally compressed, glabrous or sparsely to densely pilose or villous, especially at the summit;

ligules less than 0.5 mm, membranous, erose, often brownish;

blades 10-50 cm long, 4-12 mm wide, erect, adaxial surfaces pilose at least basally, glabrous or pilose abaxially.

keeled, glabrous or pubescent near the throat, upper sheaths much shorter than the internodes;

ligules 0.5-2 mm, membranous, dissected ciliate;

blades 20-35 cm long, 7-17 mm wide, flat, glabrous on both surfaces or the adaxial surfaces sparsely pilose.

10-40 cm, 1/4 - 2/3 as wide as long, well-exserted at anthesis;

branches relatively few, stiffly spreading or ascending; ultimate branchlets 1-sided;

pedicels 0.1-3 mm, scabridulous to scabrous, appressed.

12-50 cm, about 2/3 as wide, open;

primary branches spreading, often verticillate at the lower nodes;

pedicels 0.2-4 mm, scabrous, spreading.

2.3-3.9 mm, narrowly ellipsoid to ovoid, usually subsessile, usually pale to yellowish-green, glabrous, often falcate and gaping at the apices, rarely lanceolate, densely crowded on short, appressed branchlets, set obliquely on short pedicels.

2.5-3.4 mm long, about 1.2 mm wide, ellipsoid, glabrous.

A-A as long as the spikelets, 3-veined, keels scabrous, apices acute;

upper glumes and lower lemmas subequal, keeled, beaked, usually gaping at the apices;

lower florets sterile;

lower paleas subequal to the lower lemmas;

upper florets 1.5-2.2 mm long, about 1 mm wide, 2/5 – 3/4 as long as the spikelets, apices with a tuft of minute, thick hairs;

upper lemmas thick, stiff, clasping the upper paleas throughout their length.

usually shorter than 1.7 mm, up to 1/2 as long as the spikelets, 3-veined, subacute;

upper glumes and lower lemmas subequal, scarcely longer than the upper florets, 5-veined;

lower florets sterile or staminate;

upper florets 2.9-3 mm long, about 1 mm wide, ellipsoid, glabrous, dull, pale, obscurely transversely rugose, apices minutely pubescent.

= 18, 36.

= unknown.