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Vegetative Morphology

 
Plants perennial; sometimes cespitose, with or without rhizomes, sometimes stoloniferous.
Culms 8-180(220) cm, usually erect to ascending, sometimes strongly decumbent to prostrate, usually glabrous.
Leaves usually evenly distributed, sometimes somewhat basally concentrated.
Sheaths open for most of their length.
Auricles often present.
Ligules membranous, truncate or rounded, sometimes acute, entire or erose, often ciliolate.
Blades 1-24(25) mm wide, abaxial surfaces usually smooth or scabrous, sometimes with hairs, adaxial surfaces scabrous or with hairs, particularly over the veins, usually with unequal, not strongly ribbed, widely spaced veins, sometimes with equal, strongly ribbed, closely spaced veins.

Reproductive Morphology

 
Inflorescences spikes, usually exserted, with 1-3(5) spikelets per node.
Internodes (1.5)2-26 mm.
Rachises with scabridulous, scabrous, or ciliate edges.
Spikelets usually appressed to ascending, sometimes strongly divergent or patent, with 1-11 florets.
Distal florets often reduced.
Lowest florets usually functional, sterile and glumelike in some species.
Disarticulation usually above the glumes and beneath each floret, sometimes also below the glumes or in the rachises.
Glumes usually 2, absent or highly reduced in some species, usually equal to subequal, sometimes unequal, usually linear-lanceolate to linear, setaceous, or subulate, sometimes oblanceolate to obovate, (0)1-7-veined, sometimes keeled over 1 vein, not necessarily the central vein, the keel vein sometimes extended into an awn.
Lemmas linear-lanceolate, obscurely 5(7)-veined, apices acute, often awned, sometimes bidentate, teeth to 0.2 mm, sometimes with bristles, bristles to 10 mm.
Lemma awns terminal or from the sinus, straight or arcuately divergent, not geniculate.
Paleas from shorter than to slightly longer than the lemmas, keels scabrous or ciliate, at least in part.
Anthers 3, 0.7-7 mm.
Caryopses with hairy apices.

Species Distribution Maps

Elymus macgregorii Elymus glabriflorus Elymus virginicus Elymus curvatus
Elymus villosus Elymus riparius Elymus canadensis Elymus wiegandii
Elymus interruptus Elymus glaucus Elymus hirsutus Elymus dahuricus
Elymus sibiricus Elymus pringlei Elymus texensis Elymus svensonii
Elymus churchii Elymus diversiglumis Elymus hystrix Elymus multisetus
Elymus elymoides Elymus trachycaulus Elymus caninus Elymus violaceus
Elymus macrourus Elymus alaskanus Elymus lanceolatus Elymus stebbinsii
Elymus arizonicus Elymus bakeri Elymus scribneri Elymus sierrae
Elymus wawawaiensis Elymus albicans Elymus repens Elymus hoffmannii
Elymus tsukushiensis Elymus ciliaris Elymus semicostatus  

Chromosome Number(s)

x = 7

Additional Notes

Haplomes St, H, Y, P.

Name from the Greek elyo, 'rolled up', the caryopses being tightly embraced by the lemma and palea.

As interpreted here, Elymus is a widespread, north-temperate genus of about 150 species. It includes Sitanion Raf. and Roegneria K. Koch, but moves some taxa that others include in Elymus to Leymus, Pascopyrum, Pseudoroegneria, and Thinopyrum. Thirty-two species of Elymus are native to the Flora region. Of the seven non-native species treated, one is established (E. repens), two are distributed as forage (E. dahuricus and E. hoffmannii), two are known from ballast dumps and are not established (E. tsukushiensis and E. ciliaris), and two (E. caninus and E. semicostatus) have been attributed to the Flora region but specimens documenting the reports have not been located.

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Name/Synonymy Publication Info

Elymus L., Sp. pl. 1:83 (1753), nom. cons. prop. [C.E. Jarvis, Taxon 41:562-563 (1992)]. LEC: Elymus sibiricus L., typ. cons. prop. [Hitchc., U.S.D.A. Bull. (1915-23) 772:93 (1920), see Bowden, Canad. J. Bot. 35:991-992].

Roegneria K. Koch, Linnaea 21:413 (1848). TYPE: Roegneria caucasica K. Koch.

Elymus sect. Clinelymus Griseb. in Ledeb., Fl. ross. 4:330 (1852); Clinelymus (Griseb.) Nevski, Izv. Bot. Sada Akad. Nauk S.S.S.R. 30:640 (1932). TYPE: not designated.

Anthosachne Steudel, Syn. pl. glumac. 1:237 (1854). TYPE: Anthosachne australasica Steudel.

Campeiostachys Drobow in Schreder, Flora Uzbekistanica 1:540 (1941). TYPE: Campeiostachys schrenkiana (Fischer & C.A. Meyer ex Schrenk) Drobow.

Semeiostachys Drobow in Schreder, Flora Uzbekistanica 1:285, 539 (1941). TYPE: Semeiostachys turczaninovii (Drobow) Drobow.

Treatment from

M.E. Barkworth, J.N. Campbell, and B. Salomon. Elymus in Flora of North America, volume 24. In prep. Oxford University Press.

Fact Sheet Developed By

Pedro Oñativia Lake © 2006.