FOXTAIL BARLEY
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| File Size: 105 KB |
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Hordeum jubatum L.
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| Riley County, Kansas |
| Perennial |
| Height: 8-30 inches |
| Family: Poaceae - Grass Family |
| Flowering Period: June, July, August |
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| Culms: | | Erect or bent abruptly upward at bases, slender, hollow, glabrous, nodes dark. | | Blades: | | Flat, 1 to 5 inches long, to 1/4 inch wide, rough, tapered to sharp points. | | Sheaths: | | Loose, shorter than internodes, glabrous or lightly hairy. | | Ligules: | | Membranous, irregularly notched. | | Inflorescences: | | Spikes, conspicuously nodding, 2 to 5 inches long, about as wide, soft, greenish or purplish. | | Spikelets: | | 3 per node; central spikelet 1-flowered, fertile, sessile; lateral spikelets sterile, short-stalked; glumes awn-like, 1 to 2.75 inch long; lemmas to 1/3 inch long; central spikelet lemmas with awns 1 to 2.5 inches long; lateral spikelet lemmas short-awned. | | Habitat: | | Ditches, pastures, seep areas, waste ground, and roadsides. | | Distribution: | | Throughout Kansas. | | Forage Value: | | Foxtail barley is palatable when young but is poor forage for livestock. | | Uses: | | Native American children sometimes placed inflorescences of foxtail barley in the clothing of playmates as a joke. | | Comments: | | Tufted. The awns can cause mouth, throat, nose, and eye injuries to grazing animals and can contaminate wool. The pollen of foxtail barley causes allergies. |
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| Foxtail barley |  | | 144 KB | | Mitchell County, Kansas |
| | Foxtail barley |  | | 111 KB | | Riley County, Kansas |
| | Foxtail barley |  | | 199 KB | | Sandsage Bison Range, Finney County, Kansas |
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