Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses

SIXWEEKS FESCUE

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Vulpia octoflora (Walt. ) Rydb.

[=Festuca octoflora Walt.]

Russell County, Kansas

Annual

Height: 2-16 inches

Family: Poaceae - Grass family

Flowering Period: April, May, June

Also Called:

Six weeks grass, pullout grass.

Culms:

Erect or occasionally decumbent, solitary or loosely tufted, slender, unbranched, glabrous or finely-hairy.

Blades:

Erect or ascending, rolled inward or rarely flat, 1 to 4 inches long, to 1/12 inch wide, finely-hairy; margins may have few short hairs.

Sheaths:

Shorter than internodes, loose, keeled, ridged, glabrous or sparingly hairy.

Ligules:

Short, membranous; tip truncate, erose or ciliate; auricles absent.

Inflorescences:

Panicle, narrow, erect or with slightly drooping tip, dense, 1/2 to 4 inches long; branches short, appressed to slightly spreading.

Spikelets:

Flattened, 3-17-flowered, 1/5 to 2/5 inch long excluding awans, smooth, rough or pubescent; rachilla visible, jointed between florets; florets arranged in herringbone pattern; glumes 2, narrow, unequal, membranous, keeled; tips sharp-pointed; first glume about 1/10 inch long, second glume 3-nerved, 1/6 inch long; lemmas lanceolate, 1/8 to 1/5 inch long; rounded on back, long-pointed, smooth or rough, usually awned; awn 1/10 to 1/5 inch long.

Habitat:

Waste places, rangeland, pastures; dry, bare ground; disturbed sandy, sandy clay, and limestone gravel soils.

Distribution:

Throughout Kansas.

Reproduction:

From seed.

Forage Value:

Except for a period of two to three weeks in early spring, sixweeks fescue has very little forage value. Cattle prefer grazing areas where sixweeks fescue is absent.

Uses:

Songbirds and grouse eat the seeds.

Comments:

Sixweeks fescue is weedy but is not considered a serious problem. It can be widespread following warm, damp autumns. Livestock often uproot the plant when it is grazed, leading to the common name "pullout grass".

Sixweeks fescue inflorescence