Stipa nevadensis

Nevada needle grass

Family: Poaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Nevada needle grass is a native perennial grass found in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, Great Basin, and California Ranges in sagebrush scrub and open woodland at elevations of 1,000 to 3,450 meters. Flowering from June to August, this grass produces delicate inflorescences with pale, narrow spikelets 6 to 25 centimeters long. Growing with slender stems 20 to 85 centimeters tall, it forms dense, compact clusters with fine, inrolled leaf blades. Its leaves are narrow, typically 10 to 25 centimeters long and just 1 to 3 millimeters wide, with glabrous to lightly hairy proximal sheaths. The distinctive seed awns are 20 to 35 millimeters long, bent twice, and covered with dense hairs on the lower portion.

Habitat: Sagebrush scrub, open woodland

Bloom period: Jun-Aug

Elevation: 1000-3450 m

Bioregions: CaRH, SNH, GB

California counties: Lassen, Mono, Modoc, Inyo, Tulare, Kern, Riverside, El Dorado, Sierra, Nevada, Alpine, Tuolumne

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