Avena barbata

Slender wild oat, Slender Wild Oat

Family: Poaceae · Type: annual · Not Native

Conservation status: Cal-IPC Yes

Slender wild oat is a naturalized annual grass found in California Floristic Province, Modoc Plateau, and Mojave Desert regions in disturbed sites at elevations of 40 to 1,200 meters. Flowering from March to June, this plant produces pale green to tan spikelets with delicate, twisted awns up to 45 millimeters long. Growing with erect stems 60 to 150 centimeters tall that become increasingly upright as the plant matures, it has a distinctive branching structure. Its leaf blades are 6 to 30 centimeters long, 2 to 6 millimeters wide, and range from smooth to slightly rough-textured. The spikelets break apart above the glumes, with each floret featuring a bearded base and bristly lemma teeth.

Habitat: Disturbed sites

Bloom period: Mar-Jun

Elevation: 40-1200 m

Bioregions: CA-FP, MP, DMoj

California counties: Humboldt, Los Angeles, San Luis Obispo, Fresno, San Diego, Kern, Orange, San Bernardino, Riverside, Alameda, Butte, Imperial, Mariposa, Sacramento, San Mateo, Santa Barbara, Santa Clara, Sonoma, Tehama, Tulare, Tuolumne, Ventura, Yolo, Contra Costa, Merced, Monterey, San Benito, Santa Cruz, Sutter, San Joaquin, Stanislaus, Shasta, Nevada, Napa, Mendocino, Madera, El Dorado, Del Norte, Colusa, Calaveras, Amador, Marin, San Francisco, Lake, Solano, Placer, Plumas, Glenn, Yuba, Kings, Trinity

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