6b. var. laeve

Leaf sheaths and blades glabrous or the lowermost ones sparsely to moderately hairy. Spikelets 2.4–3.4 mm long, 2.0–2.5 mm wide, broadly ovate to broadly obovate in outline, noticeably longer than wide. July–October.

Scattered south of the Missouri River, most commonly in the Mississippi Lowlands Division (eastern U.S. west to Illinois, Missouri, and Texas). Moist depressions of upland prairies, bottomland prairies, openings of bottomland and mesic upland forests, and margins of sinkhole ponds; also old fields, ditches, roadsides, railroads, and moist, open, disturbed areas.

This variety apparently has spread in southern Missouri since Steyermark’s (1963) treatment.