Culms 2-7 dm, usually erect or nearly so, in tufts of 2-10, glabrous, or villosulous at the nodes; lowest sheaths usually papillose-pilose, the upper merely ciliate, often longer than the internodes; ligule obsolete, or a band of short hairs not over 1 mm; blades erect or strongly ascending, firm, rounded at the ciliate base, tapering from below the middle, glabrous or rarely hairy beneath, mostly 5-15 cm נ(4-)6-14(-16) mm, the upper scarcely reduced; primary panicle long-exsert, relatively few-fld, 5-10 cm, the lower branches ascending; spikelets long-pedicellate, minutely hairy, ellipsoid, 1.9-2.3 mm; first glume a fourth to two-fifths as long; second glume and sterile lemma usually purplish, subequal, equaling or barely shorter than the fr; autumnal phase similar, with a few lax branches at the upper nodes bearing somewhat smaller lvs and shorter, few-fld panicles; 2n=18. Open woods, fields, and shores; Que. and Nf. to Minn., s. to N.J. and n. Ind. (P. bicknellii; P. bushii; P. calliphyllum; Dichanthelium b.) It is possible that some of the plants usually referred here are hybrids between broad-lvd and narrow-lvd spp.
Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.
