Rytidosperma pumilum (Kirk) Connor & Edgar
≡Atropis pumila Kirk, T.N.Z.I. 14: 379 (1882)
≡Triodia pumila (Kirk) Hack. in Cheeseman Man. N.Z. Fl. 896 (1906)
≡Erythranthera pumila (Kirk) Zotov, N.Z. J. Bot. 1: 124 (1963)
≡Danthonia kirkii Zotov, T.R.S.N.Z. 73: 234 (1943) [a combination in Danthonia preoccupied by D. pumila Nees (1841)];
Lectotype: WELT 39891! D. Petrie 920 McRaes [Macraes], Otago, 1800 ft (designated by Zotov 1963 op. cit. p. 125).
Stiff, slender, bright green, usually low-growing tufts; leaves setaceous, « to sometimes = culms, disarticulating at ligule; branching intravaginal. Leaf-sheath green to purple-tinged, later whitish, not much wider than leaf-blade, glabrous, or with scattered long fine hairs; apical tuft of hairs to 1.5 mm, sometimes very minute. Ligule to 0.4 mm. Leaf-blade to 8 cm, setaceous, usually glabrous, rarely a few long fine hairs near base. Culm 1.5-25 cm, internodes smooth but finely scabrid just below inflorescence. Panicle to 3-(4) cm, shortly branched below, racemose above, of few, comparatively large, narrow spikelets; rachis and pedicels scabrid, with some short hairs on pedicels. Spikelets (3)-4-6-(8)-flowered, glumes enclosing florets. Glumes usually purplish at centre, sometimes with darker horizontal blotches, usually narrow-lanceolate, ± acute, but often shorter, more ovate and subobtuse, ± equal, (2.5)-3.5-6.5-(8.5) mm; lower 3-5-nerved, upper 3-nerved. Lemma 1.5-2.2 mm, 5-7-nerved, ovate, scattered hairs on upper ½, sometimes an obvious marginal hair tuft on either side about the level of rachilla apex, occasionally almost glabrous or at times more densely hairy with two pairs of marginal tufts and ± distinct upper and lower row of hairs, with hairs scattered between rows and a row of hairs along either margin, tip notched, mucro 0.1-0.2-(0.9) mm in notch, sometimes a shorter mucro on either lateral lobe beside notch. Palea 1.4-2 mm, < lemma, interkeel glabrous. Callus 0.1-0.3 mm, glabrous, or, in lemma with well-developed hairs, thick marginal hair tufts to 0.5 mm overlapping lemma hairs. Rachilla 0.4-0.7 mm. Anthers 0.2-0.6 mm. Caryopsis 0.7-1 × 0.3-0.5 mm; embryo 0.4-0.6 mm; hilum 0.1-0.3 mm.
N.: Volcanic Plateau; S.: along Main Divide and to the east. Montane to alpine in tussock grassland and herbfield.
Indigenous.
Also indigenous to Australia.
Specimens from south Ashburton R. and from near L. Tekapo have lemmas hairier than usual.
