Sporobolus schoenoides

Swamp prickle grass

Family: Poaceae · Type: annual · Not Native

Swamp prickle grass is a naturalized annual found in northern California bioregions including the Klamath Ranges, northern Sierra Nevada foothills, Central Valley, Central Western California, Southern California coast, Transverse Ranges, and desert mountains at elevations below 1,970 meters in wet places. Flowering from June to October, this plant produces pink to purple flowers in compact ovoid to cylindric inflorescences 3 to 75 millimeters long. Growing with decumbent stems 5 to 75 centimeters tall that form mat-like clusters, it spreads with few branches. Its leaf blades range 2 to 10 centimeters long with glabrous sheath margins, creating a delicate ground-hugging appearance. The small spikelets measure approximately 3 millimeters long, with lemmas slightly longer than the glumes.

Habitat: Wet places

Bloom period: Jun-Oct

Elevation: < 1970 m

Bioregions: KR, NCoRI, CaR, n SNF, GV, CW, SCo, WTR, SnGb, PR, MP, w DMoj

California counties: Contra Costa, Alameda, Amador, Butte, Colusa, Fresno, Los Angeles, Madera, Marin, Monterey, Napa, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Solano, Tehama, Tulare, Ventura, Lake, Mendocino, Sonoma, Yolo, Merced, Sutter, Kern, San Mateo, Plumas, Nevada, El Dorado, Kings, Lassen, Sacramento, Glenn, Yuba, Modoc, Stanislaus, Siskiyou, Shasta, Mariposa, Trinity, Imperial, San Joaquin, Santa Clara, Placer, Santa Cruz, San Benito

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