Muhlenbergia porteri

Bush muhly

Family: Poaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Bush muhly is a California native perennial found in the southern California desert mountains, Peninsular Ranges, Sierra Nevada eastern edge, and Mojave Desert in rocky habitats among boulders and shrubs at elevations of 610 to 1,680 meters. Flowering from June to October, this grass produces delicate, thread-like purple to yellow flower clusters in open, spreading panicles 4 to 15 centimeters long. Growing with wiry stems 25 to 80 centimeters tall that have distinctive knot-like lower nodes, it forms dense, intricate clumps. Its narrow leaves are 2 to 8 centimeters long and 1 to 2 millimeters wide, ranging from flat to slightly folded with truncate, toothed ligules. The plant's delicate spikelets feature hairy lemmas with slender awns 2 to 10 millimeters long, giving the grass a fine, feathery appearance.

Habitat: Among boulders or shrubs, rocky slopes, cliffs

Bloom period: Jun-Oct

Elevation: 610-1680 m

Bioregions: SnBr, PR, SNE, DMoj

California counties: San Bernardino, Inyo, San Diego, Riverside, Alameda

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