10. Eragrostis hypnoides (Lam.) Britton, Sterns & Poggenb. (creeping love grass, pony grass)

Pl. 149 f, g; Map 598

Plants annual, creeping widely by stoloniferous main stems, low‑growing and forming mats. Flowering branches 3–15 cm long, erect to ascending from sometimes spreading bases, glabrous. Leaves sometimes overlapping and appearing fascicled. Leaf sheaths with a ring of hairs at the tip and base, and sometimes also hairy along the margins, the surface glabrous or sparsely hairy, the ligule 0.3–0.9 mm long. Leaf blades 0.5–5.0 cm long, 1–3 mm wide, flat or less commonly with the margins loosely inrolled, roughened or short‑hairy on the upper surface, glabrous or short‑hairy on the undersurface. Inflorescences dense to more open, short panicles 1–5(–8) cm long, ovate in outline, the branches ascending to spreading, the axis and branches glabrous or minutely hairy. Spikelets 3–8(–15) mm long, 1.4–3.0 mm wide, very short‑stalked, appressed to spreading from the branches, with (5–)10–35 perfect florets. Pattern of disarticulation with the glumes and lemmas usually shed with age (after the fruits have been shed), leaving the persistent paleas and rachilla. Lower glume 0.5–1.0 mm long, narrowly lanceolate, glabrous or more commonly roughened along the midnerve. Upper glume 0.7–1.5 mm long, lanceolate, glabrous or more commonly roughened along the midnerve. Lemmas 1.5–2.0 mm long, lanceolate, sharply pointed at the tip, keeled, the lateral nerves relatively conspicuous, roughened along the midnerve. Anthers 0.2–0.4 mm long. Fruits 0.4–0.6 mm long, elliptic in outline, somewhat flattened, not grooved, tan. 2n=20. July–November.

Scattered nearly throughout the state (U.S., Canada, Mexico, Central America, South America, Caribbean Islands). Banks of streams and rivers, margins of ponds, lakes, and sloughs, and swamps; also ditches, canals, and wet depressions along roadsides and railroads.