Aquatic and Wetland Vascular Plants of the Northern Great Plains

Puccinellia Parl. -- Alkaligrass

Tufted perennials with flat to involute, mostly basal, pale green leaves and ultimately open panicles, the panicle branches ascending, spreading or reflexed with age, scabrous. Spikelets few- to several-flowered, elliptic to linear, subterete, disarticulating above the glumes and between the florets; glumes unequal, acute or obtuse, scarious at the tip, the first 1-nerved, the second 3-nerved; lemmas rounded on the back, acute to obtuse or truncate, scarious and often erose at the tip, often puberulent at the base, faintly 5-nerved; palea about as long as the lemma or shorter, its margins somewhat clasping the grain. Grain brown, ellipsoid or narrowly so, 1-1.5 mm long, tomentose at the tip.

References:

Church, G. L.  1949.  A cyto-taxonomic study of Glyceria and 
     Puccinellia.  Amer. J. Bot. 36:155-165.

Fernald, M. L. and G. A. Weatherby.  1916.  The genus Puccinellia in 
     eastern North America. Rhodora 18:1-23.

Lead	Characteristic	Go To
1	Lemmas rounded to truncate, not narrowed at the apex, 1.6-2 mm long; panicle branches reflexed at maturity.	P. distans
1	Lemmas acute to obtuse or rounded, narrowed at the apex, 1.8-3.2 mm long; panicle branches usually ascending to spreading.	Lead 2
2	Anthers 1.2-1.8 mm long; second glume (1)1.5-2.5 mm long; lemmas 2-3.2 mm long.	P. cusickii
2	Anthers 0.4-1 mm long; second glume 1-2 mm long; lemmas 1.8-2.5(3) mm long.	P. nuttalliana

63. Poaceae, the Grass Family

25. Puccinellia Parl. -- Alkaligrass

1. Puccinellia cusickii Weatherby -- Cusick's alkaligrass

2. Puccinellia distans (L.) Parl. -- Weeping alkaligrass

3. Puccinellia nuttalliana (Schult.) Hitchc. -- Nuttall's alkaligrass

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