Culms few in a tuft, 6-12 dm, smooth; sheaths glabrous or pilose; blades flat, soft, minutely scaberulous on the veins, sometimes pilose, 3-8 mm wide, without auricles; infl long-exsert, 1.5-3 dm, the elongate, slender branches racemiform, eventually widely spreading or deflexed, bearing spikelets only above the middle; spikelets relatively remote, the summit of one scarcely reaching the base of the next, 2-4(5)-fld, 4-8 נ2-4 mm; first glume subulate, carinate, 2.2-3.8 mm, the second ovate, 2.7-4.4 mm; lemmas broadly rounded on the back, obtuse to acute, 2.5-4.7 mm, appressed till maturity; palea acute; anthers 0.8-1.5 mm; ovary hairy at the tip; 2n=42. Moist woods; Que. and N. Engl. to Fla., w. to Man. and Tex. (F. obtusa)
Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.
Infrequent to frequent throughout the state in woodland of many kinds, but never common over any considerable area.
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Indiana Coefficient of Conservatism: C = 4
Wetland Indicator Status: FACU
Deam (1929): The surface of the sheaths, culms, and blades of this species is quite variable. A few plants re glabrous throughout.... The pubescent character has no geographical range in Indiana and so far as I can determine, no ecological significance.