Melica torreyana

Torrey's melic

Family: Poaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Torrey's melic is a California native perennial found in northwestern California, the Cascade Range foothills, northern and central Sierra Nevada, Sutter Buttes, and central western California in chaparral and conifer forest at elevations below 1,600 meters. Flowering from March to June, this grass produces delicate spikelets 3.5 to 7 millimeters long with subtle pale green to light brown coloration. Growing with stems 30 to 100 centimeters tall, ranging from decumbent to fully erect, the plant forms loose grass clusters without underground corms. Its narrow leaf blades measure 1 to 2.5 millimeters wide, with short ligules 1 to 5 millimeters long. The inflorescence features branches with 4 to 38 spikelets, and its lemmas have a slightly scabrous surface with occasional hairs near the obtuse tip.

Habitat: Chaparral, conifer forest

Bloom period: Mar-Jun

Elevation: < 1600 m

Bioregions: NW (exc NCoRH), CaRF, n&ampc SN, ScV (Sutter Buttes), CW.

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

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