Calamagrostis koelerioides

Dense-pine reed grass, Dense-Pine Reed Grass

Family: Poaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Dense-pine reed grass is a California native perennial found in northwestern, central western, and Peninsular Ranges in meadows, slopes, dry hills, and ridges at elevations below 2,300 meters. Flowering from June to August, this grass produces delicate pale greenish-white flowers in dense clusters 5 to 16 centimeters long. Growing with clustered stems 60 to 100 centimeters tall, it forms compact tufts with short, stout rhizomes. Its leaf blades are 3 to 7 millimeters wide, flat or slightly rolled, with slightly rough surfaces and a ligule 3 to 7 millimeters long. The plant's distinctive awned lemmas have a stiff, twisted awn 4 to 5.5 millimeters long, nearly equal to the glume tips.

Habitat: Meadows, slopes, dry hills, ridges

Bloom period: Jun-Aug

Elevation: < 2300 m

Bioregions: NW, CW, PR

California counties: Orange, San Diego, Butte, Glenn, Humboldt, Marin, Plumas, Santa Barbara, Siskiyou, Sonoma, Trinity, Shasta, Del Norte, Monterey, Riverside, Tuolumne, Santa Clara, San Mateo, San Luis Obispo, Mendocino, Napa, Santa Cruz, Lake, Alameda, Tehama

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