Puccinellia tenuiflora (Griseb.) Scribn. & Merr.

There are 2 sheets at Kew collected by Thomson in “Tibet Occ.”

Perennial, tufted. Culms erect, often geniculate, 30–70 cm tall, 1–2 mm in diam., terminal node in lower 1/3. Leaf sheaths glabrous; ligule 0.7–1.5 mm, obtuse; leaf blade conduplicate or slightly inrolled, 2–8 cm, 1–3 mm wide, adaxial surface scabrid. Panicle loose, 6–15 cm; branches 2–5 per node, slender, horizontally spreading, scabrid or smooth, lower part naked. Spikelets 2.5–3.5 mm, usually tinged purple, florets 2–4; lower glume ca. 0.6 mm, 1-veined, upper glume ca. 1.2 mm, 3-veined, apex subobtuse; lemmas 1.5–2.2 mm, glabrous or subglabrous, apex obtuse; palea keels smooth or with a few small teeth; anthers 0.8–1.4 mm. Fl. Jun–Jul. 2n = 14, 56.

Tufted perennial; culms 15-70 cm high, erect or geniculately ascending. Leaf-blades flat or convolute, 3-11 cm long, 1-1.5 mm wide, greyish-green, scaberulous above. Panicle 5-20 cm long, contracted at first, eventually spreading, the branches capillary, bare and smooth in the lower part, scabrid above and on the pedicels. Spikelets 3-5 mm long, 2-5-flowered, usually tinged with purple; glumes lanceolate, blunt, the lower 0.5-1.2 mm long, 1-nerved, the upper 1-1.8 mm long, 3-nerved; lemmas 1.5-2 mm long, oblong or obovate, very blunt, glab¬rous, the mid-nerve reaching the minutely serrulate-ciliate tip; palea keels smooth below, sometimes scabrid above; anthers 0.9-1.5 mm long.

Anhui, Gansu, Hebei, Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning, Nei Mongol, Qinghai, Shanxi, Xinjiang [Japan, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Russia (Siberia); SW Asia (Iran)].

Distribution: Kashmir; USSR, Mongolia, Tibet and China.

Saline wet grasslands, stable sandy beaches, saline meadows; 500–4000 m.

Atropis tenuiflora Grisebach in Ledebour, Fl. Ross. 4: 389. 1852; Puccinellia mongolica (Norlindh) Bubnova; P. tenuiflora var. mongolica Norlindh.