Bristle-tail Grass - introduced (*Psilurus incurvus)

Native to Europe. Annual. C3.

Family. Poaceae (Grass family).

Occurrence: Uncommon.

Identification:

• the flowers are in a curved spike and are recessed into the narrow stems.
• the glumes are single, tiny, and much shorter than the lemmas
• the leaves are thread-like
• the ligules are 0.1-0.5mm long.

A grass with small leaves and narrow, curved stems. Unlike Rye Grass, the spikelets have only a single (fertile) lemma, which is awned. The awns are about as long as the rest of the lemmas. The glumes are very small (c 1mm). The stems are jointed between the flowers. The spikelets may also have a sterile, unawned lemma.

Mat Grass (Hemarthria uncinata) may also have curved flower-spikes. It has much coarser stems, the glumes are larger and the spikelets are paired.

psilos: slender; oura: a tail, referring to the very narrow flower spike; incurvus: curved inwards.

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