Panicum huachucae Ashe
Small perennial tufts, basal leaves « culm leaves, in winter only a basal tuft, in spring sending out simple leafy culms each topped by a delicate panicle, later stems branching freely above, with small panicles at first hidden among leaves. Leaf-sheath greenish or often purplish, stiffly membranous, rounded; margins with many long soft hairs. Ligule ciliate, hairs soft, 3-4.5 mm, extending as a contra-ligule. Leaf-blade of basal leaves 1-2.5 cm × 4-6 mm, ovate-lanceolate, acute, of cauline leaves 4-8.5 cm × 4-8 mm, linear-lanceolate, subacuminate, all leaves firm, erect or ascending, flat, strongly ribbed without obvious midrib, abaxially short-pubescent, adaxially sparsely finely pilose to almost glabrous, but usually hairy near base; margins minutely scabrid. Culm 30-45 cm, very slender near panicle, ± erect, nodes pubescent, internodes striate with scattered long fine hairs. Panicle lax, pyramidal to ovoid, 2.5-8 × 2-5 cm; rachis with scattered fine hairs, branches and branchlets few, slender, glabrous, bearing few spikelets on rather long pedicels. Spikelets 1.5-1.8 mm, pubescent, obtuse, green to purplish. Glumes very unequal; lower 0.5-1 mm, ovate, obtuse or almost truncate, nerves 0, upper = spikelet, 7-nerved, ovate, obtuse, with short scattered hairs. Lower floret Ø: lemma similar to upper glume, 7-nerved; palea 0. Upper floret ⚥: lemma 1.2-1.4 mm, elliptic, subacute, faintly striolate, glabrous, shining, light cream; palea narrower; anthers 0.2-0.9 mm; caryopsis c. 1 × 1 mm.
N.: North Auckland (Kaitaia, Great Barrier Id), Auckland City, South Auckland. Open waste land, rough mown grassland, roadsides and tracks, margins of hot springs.
Naturalised from North America.
Some N.Z. specimens of P. huachucae were determined as the closely related P. lindheimeri, which differs in having glabrous leaf-sheaths and has only been collected once, at Kaitaia.
