Agrostis avenacea

Pacific bent grass

Family: Poaceae · Type: perennial · Not Native

Conservation status: Cal-IPC Yes

Pacific bent grass is a naturalized perennial grass found in southern North Coast, southern North Coast Ranges, Sierra Nevada Foothills, Central Valley, Central Western California, and northern Southern California coastal regions in open, often disturbed places at elevations below 300 meters. Flowering from June to July, this grass produces delicate, widely spreading inflorescences with thread-like branches 7 to 30 centimeters long. Growing 15 to 65 centimeters tall with erect, finely scabrous stems, it forms open, airy clumps. Its leaves have ligules 3 to 5 millimeters long and proximal blades 8 to 20 centimeters long, typically 1 to 3 millimeters wide and generally flat. The grass produces distinctive spikelets with bent awns 4 to 7.5 millimeters long, emerging from the middle of the lemma.

Habitat: Open, often disturbed places

Bloom period: Jun-Jul

Elevation: < 300 m

Bioregions: s NCo, s NCoR, SNF, GV, CW, n SCo

California counties: Amador, Butte, Colusa, Contra Costa, El Dorado, Marin, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Yuba, Kern, Monterey, Orange, Sacramento, Solano, San Diego, Sutter, Tehama, Glenn, Tuolumne, San Benito, Alameda, Stanislaus, Yolo, San Luis Obispo, San Francisco, Calaveras, Imperial, Placer, Merced, Alpine, Mariposa

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.