Poa cusickii subsp. epilis

Skyline blue grass, Skyline Blue Grass

Family: Poaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Skyline blue grass is a native perennial found in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in moist subalpine snowbeds and thickets at elevations of 2,400 to 3,600 meters. Flowering from July to August, this grass produces delicate pale flower clusters in dense, compact inflorescences 3 to 6 centimeters long. Growing with sparse basal tufts and stems that expose 1 to 2 nodes, it forms elegant clumps in high-altitude environments. Its leaf sheaths open partially along the stem length, with branches that are nearly smooth and appressed. This distinctive blue grass reproduces asexually through pistillate flowers, with lemmas 4 to 5.8 millimeters long and glabrous surfaces.

Habitat: Moist subalpine, especially snowbeds, thickets

Bloom period: Jul-Aug

Elevation: 2400-3600 m

Bioregions: SNH

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