Plants perennial; not rhizomatous. Culms 50-100(110) cm, usually erect, sometimes decumbent at the
base; nodes 3-5, pubescent,
puberulent, or glabrous; internodes
puberulent or glabrous. Sheaths and throats pilose or glabrous; auricles absent; ligules 0.5-1 mm, glabrous, truncate, erose; blades 10-17 cm long, 5-10 mm wide, flat, with prow-shaped tips, both
surfaces glabrous or pilose or only the adaxial surfaces pilose. Panicles 8-13 cm, open, drooping; branches ascending to spreading,
flexuous. Spikelets 15-25 mm, elliptic
to lanceolate, terete to moderately laterally compressed, with 7-11 florets. Glumes pubescent, margins often
hyaline; lower glumes 5-7.5 mm,
3-veined; upper glumes 6.5-8.5 mm,
5-veined; lemmas 7-11 mm, elliptic
to lanceolate, rounded over the midvein, backs more or less uniformly pilose or
pubescent, margins densely long-pilose, apices acute to obtuse, entire; awns 1.5-3 mm, straight, arising less
than 1.5 mm below the lemma apices; anthers
1.5-2.5 mm. 2n = 14.
Bromus kalmii grows in sandy, gravelly, or limestone soils in open
woods and calcareous fens. Its range centers in the north-central and northeastern
United States and adjacent Canadian provinces.
From Flora of Indiana (1940) by Charles C. Deam
Infrequent on low, open dunes and in marshy and springy places in the lake region. [Deam also recognizes B. purgans and notes that it is:] infrequent to frequent throughout the state in dry places, rarely in wet places, in black and white oak woods and less frequent in beech and sugar maple woods.
Perennial 5-10 dm, the culms loosely clustered or solitary, mostly glabrous except for the often hairy nodes; lvs mostly 3-6 per stem, the nodes mostly exposed; sheaths villous to occasionally glabrous; blades 1-2 dm נ5-10 mm, glabrous or hairy; ligule under 1 mm; infl nodding, 5-10 cm, the relatively few spikelets drooping on slender flexuous pedicels; spikelets 15-25 mm, 6-11-fld, softly villous; first glume 6-7 mm; 3-veined, the second 7-9 mm, 5-veined; lemmas 8-10 mm, 7-veined, obtuse, the awn 2-3 mm, the short lemma-teeth a third as wide as long; 2n=14. Dry woods, rocky banks, and sandy soil; Me. to Minn. and S.D., s. to Md. and Io.
Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.
