Plants cespitose, with shortly rhizomatous bases. Culms 30-75 cm.
Sheaths glabrous, rounded; ligules to 0.5 mm, membranous, ciliate;
blades 1.5-5 mm wide, tapering and involute distally. Panicles 5-8(10)
cm long, 1.2-2.5 cm wide, dense; branches 0.5-3 cm, erect to ascending;
pedicels 1-3 mm. Spikelets 5-10 mm, with 5-12 florets. Glumes
glabrous, usually tinged with pink, 1-veined; lower glumes 3-4.5 mm; upper
glumes 4-4.5(5) mm; lemmas 3-5 mm, usually tinged with pink, midveins
and margins pubescent on the basal 1/3-1/2, midveins shortly excurrent, lateral
veins pilose to midlength, terminating before the distal margins; paleas
0.5-1 mm, shorter than the lemmas, scabrous on the veins, broadened below, bases
bowed-out at maturity; anthers 1-1.5 mm. Caryopses (1)1.5-2 mm.
2n = unknown.
Tridens congestus grows in moist depressions, ditches, and low flats of
otherwise dry hills in Texas. It resembles T.
albescens, but usually has shorter panicles, spikelets that are more or
less evenly pink rather than purple-tipped, and more deeply cleft lemma apices.
