Flora of New Zealand Series

≡A. dyeri var. delicatior Hack. in Cheeseman Man. N.Z. Fl. 865  (1906); 

Lectotype: W 36260 (specimen on left)! D. Petrie Lake Te Anau, Otago [Jan. 1892] (No 1089 to Hackel) (designated by Edgar and Forde 1991 op. cit. p. 149).

Lax, slender tufts 6.5-30-(60) cm, with delicate panicles equalling or overtopping the usually soft flaccid leaves; branching extravaginal. Leaf-sheath membranous, light green to light brown; lower sheaths often with minute retrorse prickle-teeth or hairs, upper sheaths glabrous. Ligule 0.8-2 mm, truncate to ± obtuse, slightly erose, abaxially finely scabrid. Leaf-blade 2-8 cm × 0.5-1.5-(3) mm, flat, or folded and inrolled at margins, abaxially smooth, or sometimes scabrid, especially towards tip and on uppermost culm-leaves, adaxially ciliate-scabrid on ribs; margins sparsely scabrid, occasionally almost smooth, tip acute, scabrid. Culm usually geniculate at base or erect, internodes glabrous. Panicle (2)-4.5-8.5-(16) cm, ovate-lanceolate to pyramidal with filiform branches naked below and spreading widely at maturity; rachis, branches and pedicels sparsely scabrid. Spikelets c. 2-2.5-(3) mm, purplish green. Glumes subequal, acute, with greenish central portion and wide, colourless to purplish margins scabrid near tip; lower narrow-lanceolate, keel scabrid in upper ⅔, upper ovate-lanceolate, keel scabrid in upper ⅓ to ½. Lemma 1.4-2-(2.2) mm, glabrous, 5-nerved, ovate-oblong, truncate, ± denticulate, awnless or with delicate awn 1-3 mm, inserted at c. midpoint to c. upper ⅓ of lemma. Palea 0.3-0.6 mm, orbicular. Lodicules 0.3-0.6 mm, = or usually > palea. Callus with tufts of minute hairs. Anthers 0.4-0.7-(0.9) mm. Caryopsis 1-1.5 × 0.4-0.6 mm. 2 n = 42.

N.: south from East Cape, Volcanic Plateau, and Mt Egmont; S.: common west of Main Divide and in Fiordland, to the east in scattered localities; St. Open ground in tussock grassland, in scrub, or forest margins, sometimes in seepage; lowland to alpine.

Endemic.

Specimens collected from Teneriffe, Wairarapa are very slender, with spikelets and anthers smaller than usual, but still match A. personata in extravaginal branching and ± ascending panicle branches.

This sp. has been recorded under many different names. Early collections were referred to European A. canina L., which differs from A. personata in the longer anthers (1-1.5 mm), and acute ligules. Hackel (in Cheeseman 1906 op. cit.) described Fiordland plants as A. dyeri var. delicatior, but A. dyeri is well distinct in its longer spikelets, longer anthers, and intravaginal branching. Plants of A. personata were also equated with Australian A. parviflora R.Br., and North American A. scabra Willd., and A. perennans (Walter) Tuck.; the differences between A. personata and these three spp. are outlined by Edgar and Forde (1991 op. cit. pp. 151-152).