Flora of New Zealand Series

; Holotype: CHR 468642! H.D. Wilson BP 164 Canterbury, Banks Peninsula near shore of Lake Forsyth, c. 2 km above lake outlet, growing in ± upright tufts from turf of Selliera and Scirpus between tall clumps of Juncus maritimus, 5.2.1984.

Rather coarse, stiff tufts, 20-60 cm. Leaf-sheath firmly membranous, glabrous. Ligule 1.5-3 mm, abaxially smooth, rarely sparsely scabrid. Leaf-blade 4-15 cm × c. 0.5 mm diam., often involute, or flat and up to 2 mm wide. Culm 7-30 cm. Panicle 4-20 × 1-18 cm; branches closely scabrid. Spikelets 3-4 mm. Glumes dissimilar; lower slightly shorter, elliptic-lanceolate, acute, 1-nerved, upper elliptic-ovate, ± acuminate, 3-nerved. Lemma 2.5-3 mm, elliptic-lanceolate; awn 2.5-4 mm, straight or ± curved. Palea keels c. 0.3 mm apart. Callus hairs 0.3-0.4 mm. Rachilla prolongation almost 0, or to 0.9 mm, with hairs to 1.2 mm. Lodicules 0.8-0.9 mm. Anthers (0.5)-0.6-0.7 mm. Caryopsis 1.3-1.6 × 0.4 mm.

S.: eastern coast from North Canterbury to Bluff; St. Coastal, often in salt meadow; one record from the margin of an inland salt lake.

Endemic.

Plants of subsp. salaria are taller and coarser than plants of subsp. littoralis. Occasional plants of subsp. littoralis may reach 40 cm but usually have leaves to 5 mm wide and geniculate awns, whereas in subsp. salaria leaves are always narrow (to 2 mm wide) and the awns straight or curved.

Lachnagrostis littoralis subsp. salaria was once collected inland, CHR 402571 A. P. Druce Sutton Salt Lake Scenic Reserve, south of Middlemarch, Otago, c. 250 m, Jan. 1994.