Grass Description
Open ground, meadows and around riverbeds and seasonal lakes; most abundant where water accumulates. Often found in saline habitats and along roadsides and in other disturbed sites.
General Description
Erect slender tufted perennial plant; very green; often will grow in dense stands. Sometimes acts like an annual.
Tufted perennial grass with nodding seedheads; stems 8 to 32 inches, bent to straight, with non-hairy nodes. Sheaths open, without hairs; blades flat and rough, sometimes hairy; awns to 2 inches long.
Flower Characteristics
Nodding, bushy spike-like seedheads; often purple or reddish tinged; conspicuously bristly with long slender spreading awns; three spikelets per node, lateral spikelets smaller and reduced to awns; 1 floret in central spikelet; awns straight to ascending.
Vegetative Characteristics
Blades to 6 inches long, to 1/4 inch wide, roughened with stout projections, sometimes hairy.
Poor. Palatability is low. May be lightly grazed before seedhead development.