Panicum capillare |
Panicum sect. Panicum |
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common panicgrass, common witchgrass, old witch grass, panic capillaire, witch grass, witch panicgrass |
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Habit | Plants annual; hirsute or hispid, hairs papillose-based, often bluish or purplish. | Plants annual or perennial; perennials usually cespitose, sometimes shortly rhizomatous. | ||||
Culms | 15-130 cm, slender to stout, not woody, erect to decumbent, straight to zigzag, simple to profusely branched; nodes sparsely to densely pilose. |
2-300 cm, erect or decumbent, not succulent, sometimes almost woody at the base, often branching from the lower nodes. |
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Sheaths | rounded, hirsute or hispid, hairs papillose-based; ligules membranous, ciliate, cilia 0.5-1.5 mm; blades 5-40 cm long, 3-18 mm wide, linear, spreading. |
not compressed. |
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Panicles | 13-50 cm long, 7-24 cm wide, usually more than 1/2 as long as the plants, included at the base or exserted at maturity, disarticulating at the base of the peduncles at maturity and becoming a tumbleweed; branches spreading; pedicels 0.5-2.8 mm, scabrous, pilose. |
usually lax and diffuse; pedicels divergent. |
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Spikelets | 1.9-4 mm, ellipsoid to lanceoloid, often red-purple, glabrous. |
ellipsoid to lanceoloid, glabrous. |
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Lower glumes | (1/3)1/2 - 3/4 as long as the spikelets, (3)5-7-veined, truncate, obtuse, acute, or acuminate; lower paleas present or absent. |
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Lower | florets sterile; lower glumes 1/3– 1/2 as long as the spikelets, 1-3-veined; upper glumes 1.8-3.1 mm, 7-9-veined, midveins scabridulous; lower lemmas 1.9-3 mm, extending 0.4-1.1 mm beyond the upper florets, often stiff, straight, prominently veined distally; upper florets stramineous or nigrescent, sometimes with a prominent lunate scar at the base, often disarticulating before the glumes, leaving the empty glumes and lower lemmas temporarily persisting on the panicles. |
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2n | = 18. |
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Panicum capillare |
Panicum sect. Panicum |
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Distribution |
AL; AR; AZ; CA; CO; CT; DC; DE; FL; GA; IA; ID; IL; IN; KS; KY; LA; MA; MD; ME; MI; MN; MO; MS; MT; NC; ND; NE; NH; NJ; NM; NV; NY; OH; OK; OR; PA; RI; SC; SD; TN; TX; UT; VA; VT; WA; WI; WV; WY; AB; BC; MB; NB; NS; ON; PE; QC; SK; Virgin Islands
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Discussion | Panicum capillare grows in open areas, particularly in disturbed sites such as fields, pastures, roadsides, waste places, ditches, sand, and rock crevices, etc. It grows throughout temperate North America, including northern Mexico. It also grows in Bermuda, the Virgin Islands, and sporadically in South America, and has become naturalized in much of Europe and Asia. It appears to hybridize with P. philadelphicum. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Panicum sect. Panicum includes approximately 22 species and extends from the southern United States to Argentina. Most species grow in dry, open places, but a few grow in moist sites such as river banks. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 25. | FNA vol. 25, p. 456. | ||||
Parent taxa | Poaceae > subfam. Panicoideae > tribe Paniceae > Panicum > subg. Panicum > sect. Panicum | Poaceae > subfam. Panicoideae > tribe Paniceae > Panicum > subg. Panicum | ||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||
Name authority | L. | unknown | ||||
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