3. Cerastium brachypodum (Engelm. ex A. Gray) B.L. Rob. (short-stalked mouse-ear chickweed)

C. nutans Raf. var. brachypodum Engelm. ex A. Gray

Map 1452, Pl. 340 a, b

Plants annual. Stems 4–30 cm long, erect, unbranched or sometimes branched below the midpoint, moderately pubescent with stalked glands, these longer toward the base. Leaves sessile, or the lower leaves sometimes short-petiolate, lacking axillary clusters of leaves. Leaf blades 0.5–3.0 cm long, spatulate (some basal leaves) or oblong-lanceolate to narrowly obovate, angled or tapered to a sharply pointed tip. Flowers in narrow, somewhat crowded panicles or clusters, the stalks 0.3–1.0 cm long, 1.0–1.5 times as long as the sepals, mostly ascending, at fruiting often downward-angled from the base, densely pubescent with glandular hairs, the bracts with herbaceous, green margins. Sepals 5, 3.0–4.5 mm long, lanceolate, angled to a sharply pointed tip, green but often with narrow to broad, thin, white to translucent margins, sparsely pubescent with short glandular hairs, these not extending past the sepal tips. Petals 5, 3–5(–6) mm long, 1.0–1.5(–2.0) times as long as the sepals, shallowly 2-lobed at the tip, the veins usually not apparent. Stamens 10. Styles 5. Fruits (5–)8–12 mm long, about 1.0–1.5 times as long as the sepals, curved. Seeds 0.4–0.7 mm wide, the surface tuberculate, yellowish brown. 2n=34. March–June.

Scattered, mostly south of the Missouri River (western U.S. east to Wisconsin, Virginia, and Georgia; Canada; Mexico). Glades, upland prairies, ledges and tops of bluffs, openings of mesic to dry upland forests, savannas, banks of streams and rivers, and margins of ponds and lakes; also pastures, ditches, railroads, roadsides, and open, disturbed areas.

Cerastium brachypodum sometimes has been treated as a variety of C. nutans. Although the two taxa share the sparse sepal pubescence that separates them from all other Cerastium species in Missouri, they are otherwise distinct (Steyermark, 1963).