Classification
 Nomenclature
Scientific Name:
Puccinellia stricta (Hook.f.) C.H.Blom (1930)
Synonymy:
  • Glyceria stricta Hook.f., Bot. Antarct. Voy. II. (Fl. Nov.-Zel.) Part I, 304 (1853)
  • Atropis stricta (Hook.f.) Hack. in Cheeseman, Man. New Zealand Fl. 914 (1906)
  • = Poa syrtica F.Muell. (1855)
  • Festuca syrtica (F.Muell.) F.Muell. (1873)
  • Panicularia syrtica (F.Muell.) Kuntze (1891)
  • = Glyceria tenuispica Steud. (1855)
  • = Atropis stricta var. suborbicularis Hack. in Cheeseman, Man. New Zealand Fl. 915 (1906)
  • Puccinellia stricta var. suborbicularis (Hack.) Allan & Jansen, Trans. Roy. Soc. New Zealand 69: 266 (1939)
  • = Puccinellia stricta f. luxurians Allan & Jansen, Trans. Roy. Soc. New Zealand 69: 266 (1939)
  • = Puccinellia stricta f. pumila Allan & Jansen, Trans. Roy. Soc. New Zealand 69: 266 (1939)
Vernacular Name(s):
salt grass
 Description

Light bluish green or rarely pale yellow-green perennial tufts, (2.5)–10–50–(65) cm, with stiff culms and leaves, or with finer and less rigid leaves; branching intravaginal. Leaf-sheath glabrous, submembranous to subcoriaceous, ± distinctly ribbed, light brownish to purplish. Ligule 0.7–1.5–(2) mm, glabrous, rounded to truncate, or ± tapered centrally and acute. Leaf-blade 1–12 cm ×c. 0.5 mm diam., involute, rigid and erect, or finer and softer, abaxially glabrous, adaxially sparsely scabrid on ribs, or sometimes densely scabrid throughout; margins scabrid, narrowed to fine acute tip. Culm (2)–5–20–(40) cm, erect, hidden by uppermost leaf-sheath at flowering, later visible, internodes glabrous. Panicle (2)–4.5–14.5–(20) × 0.2–5.5 cm, at first narrow-linear, racemose above, with few, erect, usually scabrid branches below, later more open with ± spreading branches naked below. Spikelets 3.5–9–(10.5) mm, 2–10-flowered, narrow, almost terete, light green to purplish. Glumes often quite unequal, elliptic-oblong, margins and sometimes midnerve minutely ciliate near apex; lower (0.6)–0.8–2.3 mm, 1-nerved, subacute to subobtuse, upper (1.3)–2–3.5 mm, 3-nerved, subobtuse to obtuse. Lemma (2)–2.5–3–(4) mm, 5-nerved, broad-elliptic, with very minute hairs at base not usually visible at ×10, and occasionally a few minute hairs on nerves near base, midnerve usually not quite reaching finely ciliate, obtuse apex. Palea ≤ lemma, apex bifid, keels scabrid in upper ⅔. Rachilla 0.5–1 mm. Anthers 0.4–1 mm. Caryopsis 1–1.8 × 0.4–0.7 mm.

[From: Edgar and Connor (2000) Flora of New Zealand. Volume 5 (second printing).]

 Biostatus
Indigenous (Non-endemic)
 Bibliography
Allan, H.H.; Jansen, P. 1939: Notes on the Puccinelliae of New Zealand. Transactions of the Royal Society of New Zealand 69: 265–269.
Cheeseman, T.F. 1906: Manual of the New Zealand Flora. Government Printer, Wellington.
de Lange, P.J.; Rolfe, J.R.; Barkla J.W.; Courtney, S.P.; Champion, P.D.; Perrie, L.R.; Beadel, S.N.; Ford, K.A.; Breitwieser, I.; Schönberger, I.; Hindmarsh-Walls, R.; Heenan, P.B.; Ladley, K. 2018: Conservation status of New Zealand indigenous vascular plants, 2017. New Zealand Threat Classification Series. No. 22. [Not Threatened]
de Lange, P.J.; Rolfe, J.R.; Champion, P.D.; Courtney, S.P.; Heenan, P.B.; Barkla, J.W.; Cameron, E.K.; Norton, D.A.; Hitchmough, R.A. 2013: Conservation status of New Zealand indigenous vascular plants, 2012. New Zealand Threat Classification Series 3. Department of Conservation, Wellington. [Not Threatened]
Edgar, E. 1996: Puccinellia Parl. (Gramineae: Poeae) in New Zealand. New Zealand Journal of Botany 34: 17–32.
Hooker, J.D. 1852–1853 ("1853"): The Botany of the Antarctic Voyage of H.M. Discovery Ships Erebus and Terror in the Years 1839–1843, under the command of Captain Sir James Clark Ross. II. Flora Novae-Zelandiae. Part I. Flowering plants. Lovell Reeve, London.
Williams, A.R. 2007: Puccinellia (Poaceae) in Western Australia. Nuytsia 16(2): 435–467.