Aquatic and Wetland Vascular Plants of the Northern Great Plains
65. Typhaceae, the Cattail Family
1. Typha L. -- Cattail3. Typha X glauca Godr. -- Hybrid cattail
The sterile hybrid between T. angustifolia and T. latifolia, usually more robust than the parents, mostly 2-3 m tall, intermediate between the parental spp. in nearly all other details. Leaves green to glaucous-green, mostly 5-12 mm wide, the auricles of the leaf rounded, usually surpassing the base of the blade. Staminate and pistillate portions of the spike occasionally contiguous or more commonly separated by an interval of up to 4 cm; staminate portion 6-18 cm long, 0.8-1.2 cm thick at anthesis, staminate bracteoles pale brown, anthers 2-3 mm long, pollen usually released in a mixture of monads, diads, triads and tetrads; pistillate portion of the spike dark brown, 10-20 cm long, 1-2 cm thick at maturity, pistillate bracteoles present, reduced and appearing like gynophore hairs with slightly broadened brown tips, about equaling the gynophore hairs, narrower than the linear-lanceolate stigmas, the gynophore hairs white or slightly brown-pigmented toward the tips, stigmas linear-lanceolate, curved with age, 0.6-1.2 mm long. Flowering Jun, fruiting late Jul--Sep. Same habitats as T. angustifolia; common, often abundant; (Occurs wherever the ranges of T. angustifolia and T. latifolia are sympatric).
Since T. X glauca is sterile, reproduction is totally vegetative by rhizomes and clone fragmentation. The hybrid cattail is competitively superior to both parents under unstable water conditions and is often viewed as a problem to maintaining open areas in semipermanent marshes.
Inflorescences and greatly enlarged achene of T. X glauca. |
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