Brachypodium distachyon

False brome

Family: Poaceae · Type: annual · Not Native

Conservation status: Cal-IPC Yes

False brome is a naturalized annual grass found in southern North Coast Ranges, southern California Ranges, Sierra Nevada, Great Valley, Central Western California, southern California Coast, southern Channel Islands, Peninsular Ranges, and desert regions in disturbed areas and dry slopes at elevations below 900 meters. Flowering from April to July, this grass produces pale green to green spikelets in loose clusters up to 7 centimeters long. Growing with decumbent to erect stems 15 to 40 centimeters tall, the plant forms loosely tufted clusters with conspicuously pubescent nodes. Its leaf blades are flat, 1.5 to 8 centimeters long and 3 to 5 millimeters wide, spreading from the stem. The spikelets feature 7 to 15 florets with lemmas 7 to 10 millimeters long and awns 4 to 17 millimeters in length.

Habitat: Disturbed areas, dry slopes

Bloom period: Apr-Jul

Elevation: < 900 m

Bioregions: s NCoR, s CaRF, SN, GV, CW, SCo, s ChI (Santa Catalina Island), PR, DSon

California counties: Marin, Amador, Butte, Contra Costa, Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, Solano, Sonoma, Yuba, Alameda, Calaveras, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Joaquin, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Santa Clara, Ventura, El Dorado, Sacramento, Tuolumne, Nevada, Mariposa, San Mateo, Monterey, Tehama, Stanislaus, Napa, Yolo, Merced, Shasta, Placer, Santa Cruz

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