Elymus spicatus

Blue bunch wheat grass

Family: Poaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Blue bunch wheat grass is a native perennial grass found in the Klamath Ranges, northern Coast Ranges, Cascade Range, northern and central Sierra Nevada, and Modoc Plateau in sagebrush steppe and open woodland at elevations of 670 to 2,190 meters. Flowering from June to August, this grass produces delicate spikes with slender green or bluish-green stems forming dense, clustered tufts. Growing 30 to 100 centimeters tall with well-developed grass auricles, it forms distinctive bunched or sometimes slightly spreading clumps. Its narrow leaves are 2 to 6 millimeters wide, ranging from flat to loosely rolled, with extremely short ligules less than half a millimeter long. The grass produces elongated narrow inflorescences 8 to 16 centimeters long, with spikelets bearing 4 to 9 individual florets and potential awns up to 25 millimeters long.

Habitat: Sagebrush steppe, open woodland

Bloom period: Jun-Aug

Elevation: 670-2190 m

Bioregions: KR, NCoR, CaR, n&ampc SN, MP

California counties: Lassen, Modoc, Alpine, Mariposa, Siskiyou, Trinity, Riverside, Shasta

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