''Vulpia elliotea'', known by the common name sand fescue or squirreltail fescue, is an annual grass native to the southeastern United States. Its specific epithet ''elliotea'' is named for its discoverer,
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.
Description
''Vulpia elliotea'' is an erect grass, growing up to in height. Its leaf sheaths are glabrous, and its blades are typically glabrous though they can be scabrous above. The involute blades are wide. The inflorescence is long.
[ The erect ]panicle
A panicle is a much-branched inflorescence. (softcover ). Some authors distinguish it from a compound spike inflorescence, by requiring that the flowers (and fruit) be pedicellate (having a single stem per flower). The branches of a panicle are of ...
has ascending spikelet
A spikelet, in botany, describes the typical arrangement of the flowers of grasses, sedges and some other Monocots.
Each spikelet has one or more florets. The spikelets are further grouped into panicles or spikes. The part of the spikelet that ...
s long. The first glume
In botany, a glume is a bract (leaf-like structure) below a spikelet in the inflorescence (flower cluster) of grasses (Poaceae) or the flowers of sedges (Cyperaceae). There are two other types of bracts in the spikelets of grasses: the lemma and ...
is long; the second glume is long. The typically pubescent lemma
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s are long, and the awn
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s are two to four times as long. The grass flowers from May to June.
Distribution and habitat
''Vulpia elliotea'' grows in dry, sandy prairies from New Jersey to Texas, up to southern Illinois and Missouri.
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q15514266
Plants described in 1945
Pooideae