| Author | Steudel | |
| Distribution | From the Outer Banks to the lower Piedmont, and sparingly in the mid-upper Piedmont; disjunct to Swain County (Route 28 below Deals Gap).
Native to South America; in N.A. southeastern VA to FL and TX; CA. | |
| Abundance | Frequent to common in the southeastern half of the state, except uncommon in the mid-upper Piedmont and rare in the Mountains. | |
| Habitat | Mostly in moist soil of roadsides, powerlines, disturbed soil, fields, meadows, ditches. | |
| Phenology | Flowering and fruiting May-October. | |
| Identification | Vasey-grass is our tallest member of the genus and may reach 6 or even 7 feet tall. It has 10-30 inflorescence branches and long-hairy spikelets, so is easy to identify. | |
| Taxonomic Comments | Paspalum is a genus of more than 300 species, found mostly in the New World. The genus is quite easily identified by the neat row of spikelets along each side of a flattened rachis (inflorescence branch), and also by the hemispherical outline of each spikelet. In some species there are only 2 such inflorescence branches, paired at the stem summit; in most of our species there are 3-4 branches; and in a few there may be many. Keys ask whether spikelets are paired or not -- that is, at each node on each side of the rachis there are pairs of spikelets on tiny stalklets. Care must be taken with a hand lens to make sure there are 2 stalklets at each node, as frequently one of the two spikelets will not grow. Non-paired or single spikelets will clearly have only a single stalklet per node. | |
| Other Common Name(s) | | |
| State Rank | SE | |
| Global Rank | GNR | |
| State Status | | |
| US Status | | |
| USACE-agcp | FAC link |
| USACE-emp | FAC link |
