Muhlenbergia ligularis (Hack.) Hitchc.

Loosely tufted annuals to short-lived perennials. Culms 2−12 cm tall, 0.2−0.4 mm diameter just below the panicle, erect or decumbent, slender, glabrous, sometimes flowering the first year, up to 15 cm broad, dying in the centre, profusely branched below, a short branchlet with fascicled leaves borne at each node, with 4−6 nodes; internodes 2−20 mm long. Leaf sheaths 2−20 mm long, generally shorter than the internodes, glabrous, ridged, flattened by the densely fascicled branches; ligules 0.6−2.5 mm long, membranous to hyaline, apex truncate to rounded; blades 0.3−2.2 cm long, 0.8−1.5 mm wide, flat or folded, prominently veined, thick, firm, usually with whitish-thickened midvein and margins, conspicuously crystalline or spiculate on both surfaces, otherwise glabrous below, sparsely scaberulous above and along margins, tapering to a boat shaped tip. Panicles 1.0−3.0 cm long, 0.3−1.4 cm wide, long exserted or included in the uppermost sheath, loosely contracted; branches 5−9 mm long, one per node, appressed or reflexed at maturity up to 70° from the culm axis; pedicels 1−3 mm long, stiff, densely scabrous, spiculate, erect. Spikelets 1.5−3.0 mm long, often plumbeous to reddish-purple; glumes 1.0−1.9 mm long, subequal, glabrous, apex acute to obtuse, often minutely erose, greenish-grey; lower glumes 1.0−1.7 mm long, 1-veined; upper glumes 1.1−1.9 mm long, 1-veined or occasionally 3-veined; lemmas 1.5−3.0 mm long, lanceolate, 3-veined, keeled, glabrous, mottled with greenish-black areas or dark greenish mottles on a pale background, apex minutely scaberulous, acuminate, entire or mucronate; mucro rarely more than 1 (−1.2) mm long; paleas 1.4−2.9 mm long, lanceolate, glabrous; anthers 0.8−1.1 mm long, purplish becoming pale. Caryopses 0.8−1.2 mm long, elliptic to fusiform, brownish.

This species ranges from Guatemala and Costa Rica (Pohl 1980, at Chirripo Grande) to Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru and Argentina.