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beardless oatgrass, beardless oats, Wolf's false oat, Wolf's trisetum

Habit Plants perennial, with both fertile and sterile shoots; shortly rhizomatous.
Culms

20-80 (100) cm, erect, glabrous or retrorsely pubescent below the nodes.

Leaves

usually concentrated on the lower 1/3 of the culms;

sheaths glabrous or sparsely retrorse-pilose, sometimes scabridulous;

ligules (1.2)2.5^1(6) mm, truncate to rounded;

blades to 15 cm long, 2-7 mm wide, flat, ascending, lax, smooth or scabrous, sometimes sparsely pilose, often involute near the sometimes prowlike apices.

Panicles

(10)20-40(50) cm long, usually 1-1.5 cm wide, stiffly erect, green, tan, or purple-tinged;

branches appressed-ascending, the spikelets evenly distributed.

Spikelets

4-7(8) mm, usually subsessile, rarely on pedicels to 4 mm, ovate, with 2(3) florets;

rachilla internodes 1.5-2 mm;

rachilla hairs to 1 mm.

Glumes

subequal, usually longer than the lowest florets;

lower glumes 4-7 mm;

upper glumes 4-6.5 mm, a little wider than the lower glumes;

callus hairs shorter than 0.5 mm;

lemmas 4-6.5 mm, lanceolate, firmer than the glumes, scabridulous-puberulent, obscurely bifid, unawned or awned, awns to 2 mm, arising just below and rarely exceeding the apices;

paleas shorter than the lemmas;

anthers (0.6)1(1.5) mm.

Caryopses

to 3 mm, pubescent.

2n

= 14.

Trisetum wolfii

Distribution
from FNA
CA; CO; ID; MT; NM; NV; OR; UT; WA; WY; AB; BC; SK
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Discussion

Trisetum wolfii grows in moist meadows and marshes, and on stream banks in aspen groves and parks in the spruce-fir forest zone, at medium to high, but usually not alpine, elevations. It is restricted to southwestern Canada and the western United States.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Source FNA vol. 24, p. 745.
Parent taxa Poaceae > subfam. Pooideae > tribe Poeae > Trisetum
Sibling taxa
T. aureum, T. canescens, T. cernuum, T. flavescens, T. interruptum, T. melicoides, T. orthochaetum, T. sibiricum, T. spicatum
Name authority Vasey
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