Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses

WINTER BENTGRASS

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Agrostis hyemalis (Walt. ) Britton, Sterns & Poggenburg

Anderson County, Kansas

Perennial

Height: 8 to 24 inches

Family: Poaceae - Grass Family

Flowering Period: April, May, June

Culms:

Ascending to stiffly erect, very slender; nodes glabrous.

Blades:

Mostly basal, flat or margins often rolled inward at maturity, 1 1/5 to 4 inches long, to 1/10 inch wide, minutely rough.

Sheaths:

Usually longer than internode, glabrous, margins open.

Ligules:

Membranous, 1/12 to 1/6 inch long.

Inflorescences:

Panicles, purplish, broadly ovate, 4 to 14 inches long, 1 1/2 to 10 inches wide, open at maturity; primary branches whorled, slender, hairlike, wavy, drooping, re-branching in upper 1/4, no spikelets on lower half; lowest branches 2 to 6 inches long.

Spikelets:

Clustered at branch tips on short pedicels, narrowly ovate, to 1/12 inch long, greenish or purplish; 1 floret per spikelet; glumes nearly equal or first glume slightly longer, keeled, glabrous or rough, tips acute or acuminate; lemmas 1/25 to 1/12 inch long, glabrous, awnless.

Habitat:

Open pastures and prairies, ditches, and roadsides; more abundant in sandy or gravelly soils but may also occur in moist loam soils.

Distribution:

East 2/3 of Kansas

Origin:

Native

Forage Value:

Winter bentgrass is a tufted cool season grass with limited forage value.

Comments:

Other common names are hairgrass, due to the delicate panicle branches, and ticklegrass. The inflorescence breaks away at maturity and becomes a tumbleweed.

Winter bentgrass