6 Phragmites australis (Cav.) Trin. ex Steud. - Common Reed

Date: January 9, 2021 Loca on: Ca us Island County Park, Toms River, New Jersey. Soil condi ons + habitat: coastal, shallow submerged plant in what appears as sandy clay loam soil with slight odor of sulfur. Height & habit: 5-8 tall, individual narrow stalk, individual, in groups. Light and moisture condi ons: full sun with wet, shallow submerged soil depending on de. Eleva on: at sea level or slightly below

Characteris cs: Leaves: long, singular, fl at, oblong leaves with parallel veins beginning at node off main stem and ending at a point Stem: singular main stem, tall, ver cal, narrow and hollow with nodes where leaves begin. Dry, bri le and woody, golden/tan color Roots: green, s lt root, short horizontal roots from base of stem. Possible rhizome present. Flower: compact, furry panicle infl orescence. Glumes unequal in length and shorter than lemma. Palea appears shorter than lemma on several spiklets

Iden fi ca on: Specimen appeared to be a monocot judging by the parallel veins on the leaves. This was confi rmed on page 23 of ‘Botany In a Day’ which lead me to the key to monocot fl owers sec on on page 34. Here, I found the plant to be a grass as it has ‘knee like joins (nodes) present on the main fl ower stem’. The grasses sec on(pg 207) of the guide further described grassy plants with ‘knee like nodes on hollow fl ower stems’ belonging to the family Poaceae (Elpel, 2018.)

From here I a empted to Iden fy specifi c characteris cs and input them into the Grasses of New Jersey plant key on the ‘USDA plant database’. I started by describing the roots as having rhizomes present, since the specimen I pulled out of the ground had parallel roots and another grass specimen was also unearthed. Unfortunately, due to the soil being mostly frozen and submerged the root broke before I could inves gate further. I then entered the characteris cs of the stem. Entering that it was erect or ascending, with hollow internodes as discovered from the site and infl orescence 2-6m tall. As for the leaves I noted the leaf blades as mostly fl at and linear. This le several entries un l I entered that I believed the lemma was awnless and the glumes were dis nctly unequal. This le fi ve species of three genera which matched:

Upon entering that the palea appeared shorter than the lemma, one species was le :

Panicum amarum Spar na alternifl ora Panicum virgatum Spar na cynosuroides Phragmites australis

Phragmites australis (Cav.) Trin. ex Steud. - Common Reed

In addi on to the matching characteris cs, the plants are visually similar. A Botanists Vocabulary was referenced to be er understand all terms found on the USDA database. (Pell & Angell, 2016)

Iden ty: Kingdom: Plantae Subkingdom: Tracheobionata – Vascular Plants Superdivision: Spermatophyta – Seed Plants Division: Magnoliophyta – Flowering Plants Class: Liliopsida - Monocotyledons Subclass: Commenlinidae Order: Cyperales Family: Poaceae/Gramineae - Grass family Genus: Pharagmites Adans. - Reed Species: Pharagmites Australis (Cav.) Trin.ex Steud. - Common Reed (USDA, 2021)

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