| Section 5 » Order Cyperales » Family Poaceae |
Show/Hide Synonym
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| Tridens flavus | = | Tridens flavus var. flavus | Gleason and Cronquist (1991) | | | Tridens flavus | = | Tridens flavus var. flavus | Flora of North America (1993b, 1997, 2000, 2002a, 2002b, 2003a, 2004b, 2005, 2006a, 2006b, 2006c, 2007a, 2009, 2010) | | | Tridens flavus | = | Tridens flavus var. flavus | Kartesz (1999) | | | Tridens flavus | = | Tridens flavus var. flavus | Radford, Ahles, and Bell (1968) | | | Tridens flavus | = | Tridens flavus var. flavus | Wunderlin & Hansen Flora of Florida (3) | | | Tridens flavus | = | Triodia flava | Fernald (1950) | | | Tridens flavus | = | Triodia flava | Gleason (1952) | | | Tridens flavus | = | Triodia flava | Flora of West Virginia | | | Tridens flavus | < | Triodia flava | Small (1933, 1938) | (also see Tridens chapmanii) | | Tridens flavus | < | Tridens flavus | Wofford (1989) | | | Source: Weakley's Flora |
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| Author | (L.) A.S. Hitchcock | |
| Distribution | Throughout the state, including the Outer Banks/barrier islands. No doubt present in every county.
NH to NE, south to FL and TX. | |
| Abundance | Common throughout, except rare or uncommon on the Outer Banks. Oddly few collections from the northeastern counties, though seemingly still common in that region. | |
| Habitat | Dry to mesic soil of forest and woodland openings, glades, barrens, fields, pastures, roadsides, powerlines. This is a very widespread species of dry and open habitats statewide, though not usually found in overly disturbed clearings. |
| Phenology | Flowering and fruiting late July-October. | |
| Identification | Tall Redtop stems grow 3-5 feet tall, with few leaves and an open inflorescence about a foot long. It is very similar to T. chapmanii, but that plant is more robust, the spikelets are darker and much browner (vs. reddish-purple in T. flavus), and the spikes are widely divergent from the inflorescence branches (vs. essentially appressed in T. flavus). The purplish or purplish-red color of the triangular-shaped inflorescence is a familiar sight in many openings and clearings. | |
| Taxonomic Comments | None. However, note that older references usually had T. chapmanii included within this species.
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| Other Common Name(s) | Redtop -- the usual common name prior to the splitting out of T. chapmaniii, named here as Chapman's Redtop. Purpletop Tridens is the name most website use, but this website will not use a genus (i.e., Tridens) as a group common name if an alternate group name is available -- in this case Redtop. | |
| State Rank | S5 | |
| Global Rank | G5 | |
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| US Status | | |
| USACE-agcp | FACU link |
| USACE-emp | FACU link |
