Biorepository Data Portal

Plants forming small clumps, with knotty rhizomes less than 2 mm thick. Basal rosettes well-differentiated; sheaths pubescent; blades ovate to lanceolate, dark green. Culms 25-75 cm, initially erect, often sprawling in the fall, nodes densely retrorsely bearded; internodes glabrous, or pilose with papillose-based hairs; fall phase branching from the midculm nodes, branches nearly erect, sparsely rebranching, blades and secondary panicles only slightly reduced. Cauline leaves 4-6, often with a transitional leaf above the basal rosette; sheaths not overlapping, bases puberulent to retrorsely pilose, margins ciliate, collars pubescent; ligules 0.4-0.9 mm, membranous, ciliate, cilia longer than the membranous portion; blades 3-6 times longer than wide, 15-40 mm wide, ovate-lanceolate, glabrous, puberulent, or pilose, with 11-15 major veins and 40-120 minor veins, bases cordate, margins with papillose-based cilia. Panicles 4-12 cm long, 4-12 cm wide, about as long as wide when fully expanded, partially included to tardily exserted, with 16-60 spikelets. Spikelets 3.8-5.2 mm long, 1.7-2.2 mm wide, narrowly ellipsoid, pubescent or puberulent. Lower glumes 1/3-1/2 as long as the spikelets, narrowly triangular; upper glumes shorter than the spikelets; lower florets usually staminate; upper florets pointed, with a minute tuft of hairs. 2n = 18, 36.

Dichanthelium boscii usually grows in semi-open areas in dry oak-hickory woods of the eastern United States. The primary panicles are open-pollinated and are produced from late April through June (and sometimes again in the fall); the secondary panicles are partly open-pollinated, and are produced from July through September.

Culms clustered, erect or ascending, often somewhat geniculate, 3-7 dm, glabrous to puberulent, sparsely to usually densely retrorse-bearded at the nodes; sheaths ciliate, pubescent at the top, glabrous to softly villous on the back; blades lanceolate, spreading, ciliate toward the cordate base, glabrous to soft-hairy on both sides, the larger ones 6-12 cm נ15-30 mm, the lateral veins differentiated into 2 types as in no. 39 [Panicum clandestinum L.]; primary panicle usually sessile or partly included, or eventually exsert, 5-10 cm, ovoid with a few ascending or spreading branches, relatively few-fld; spikelets oblong-obovoid, sparsely hairy, usually papillose, 3.8-5.2 mm; first glume narrowly obovoid, acute, ca half as long; second glume slightly shorter than the sterile lemma; autumnal phase sparsely branched from the middle nodes, the blades half as large, the panicles much reduced, partly included; 2n=18, 36. Woods; Mass. to Ill. and Mo., s. to Fla. and Tex. (Dichanthelium b.)

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

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