Hartweg's Crown Grass

Paspalum buckleyanum Vasey, Bull. Torrey
Club 13: 167. 1886.
A glabrous perennial with flat leaf-blades and pubescent compressed spikelets. Stems erect, 6-8 dm. tall; leaf-sheaths smooth and glabrous; blades 2 dm. long or less, 2-4 mm. wide, flat, of medium texture, glabrous, rough above, smooth beneath; racemes 2-4, erect, 5-7 cm. long, the rachis 1.5-2 mm. wide; spikelets in pairs, but little convex on one side, often so crowded as to appear as if in 4 rows, 3 mm. long and about 1.5 mm. wide, elliptic, the first scale wanting, the second and third scales 3-nerved, densely appressed-pubescent, the fruiting scale yellowish, slightly convex in cross-section.
Type locality : Texas. Distribution : Texas and Mexico.

Perennials, Terrestrial, not aquatic, Stems trailing, spreading or prostrate, Stems nodes swollen or brittle, Stems geniculate, decumbent, or lax, sometimes rooting at nodes, Stems caespitose, tufted, or clustered, Stems compressed, flattened, or sulcate, Stem internodes solid or spon gy, Stem internodes hollow, Stems with inflorescence less than 1 m tall, Stems with inflorescence 1-2 m tall, Stems, culms, or scapes exceeding basal leaves, Leaves mostly cauline, Leaves conspicuously 2-ranked, distichous, Leaves sheathing at base, Leaf sheath mostly open, or loose, Leaf sheath smooth, glabrous, Leaf sheath hairy, hispid or prickly, Leaf sheath hairy at summit, throat, or collar, Leaf sheath and blade differentiated, Leaf blades linear, Leaf blades 2-10 mm wide, Leaf blades mostly flat, Leaf blades mostly glabrous, Leaf blades scabrous, roughened, or wrinkled, Ligule present, Ligule an unfringed eciliate membrane, Inflorescence terminal, Inflorescence solitary, with 1 spike, fascicle, glomerule, head, or cluster per stem or culm, Inflorescence a panicle with narrowly racemose or spicate branches, Inflorescence with 2-10 branches, Inflorescence branches 1-sided, Rachis dilated, flat, central axis to which spikelets are attached, Rachis winged, Rachis angula r, Flowers bisexual, Spikelets pedicellate, Spikelets dorsally compressed or terete, Spikelet less than 3 mm wide, Spikelets with 1 fertile floret, Spikelets with 2 florets, Spikelet with 1 fertile floret and 1-2 sterile florets, Spikelets paired at rachis nodes, Spikelets all alike and fertille, Spikelets bisexual, Spikelets disarticulating below the glumes, Spikelets secund, in rows on one side of rachis, Rachilla or pedicel glabrous, Glumes present, empty bracts, Glumes 1 clearly present, the other greatly reduced or absent, Glumes distinctly unequal, Glumes equal to or longer than adjacent lemma, Glume equal to or longer than spikelet, Glumes 3 nerved, Lemma similar in texture to glumes, Lemma 3 nerved, Lemma glabrous, Lemma apex truncate, rounded, or obtuse, Lemma awnless, Lemma straight, Palea present, well developed, Palea shorter than lemma, Stamens 3, Styles 2-fid, deeply 2-branched, Stigmas 2, Fruit - caryopsis.