Vascular Plants of North Carolina
Section: Common Name: Scientific Name: Family:
Account for Redtop Panicgrass - Coleataenia rigidula ssp. rigidula   (Bosc ex Nees) LeBlond
Members of Poaceae:
Members of Coleataenia with account distribution info or public map:
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Section 5 » Family Poaceae
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Author(Bosc ex Nees) LeBlond
DistributionCoastal Plain, Sandhills, and lower Piedmont; a few sites in middle Piedmont. Probably under-collected, and gaps will be filled over time.

ME and MI south to FL and TX; Central America.
AbundanceUncommon to frequent.
HabitatMost often in moist to seasonally wet, disturbed soils of roadsides, scrapes, ditches, marshes, meadows, powerlines, swamp openings. It seems not to have a natural habitat, but is a disturbance specialist.
PhenologyFlowering and fruiting July-October.
IdentificationC. rigida stands out by its broad and long leaves (up to 20 mm wide by up to 1.6 feet long) and tall stems 2.5-5 feet. Subspecies condensa has strongly ascending to appressed inflorescence branches, whereas subspecies rigidula has an open inflorescence with spreading branches.
Taxonomic CommentsIn older texts Panicum agrostoides var. agrostoides.

Members of the genus Coleataenia have been split from Panicum by the subsessile spikelets (nearly stalkless, vs. stalk greater than 2 mm long) and spikelets which grow only on one side of each branch (vs. essentially on all sides). C. anceps and C. rigidula have lower stems relatively flattened, unlike Panicum.
Other Common Name(s)It needs another name, as C. stipitata, of all the members of the genus, has red or rosy pink inflorescences.
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