Meadow Foxtail
Encyclopedia
Perennial plant
A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives for more than two years. The term is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter lived annuals and biennials. The term is sometimes misused by commercial gardeners or horticulturalists to describe only herbaceous perennials...
grass, belonging to the grass family (Poaceae). It is native to Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
and Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
.
This common plant is found on grasslands, especially on neutral soil
Soil
Soil is a natural body consisting of layers of mineral constituents of variable thicknesses, which differ from the parent materials in their morphological, physical, chemical, and mineralogical characteristics...
s. It is found on moist, fertile soils, but avoids waterlogged, light or dry soils. The species forms dense swards leading to low botanical diversity.
This species is widely cultivated for pasture and hay, and has become naturalised in many areas outside of its native range, including Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
and North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
.
Identification
It flowers from April until June - one of the earliest grasses to do so. Any survey work carried out in mid-Summer may miss the grass as a result of this.It can grow to a height of about 110 cm. The stem
Plant stem
A stem is one of two main structural axes of a vascular plant. The stem is normally divided into nodes and internodes, the nodes hold buds which grow into one or more leaves, inflorescence , conifer cones, roots, other stems etc. The internodes distance one node from another...
is erect or geniculate at the base, the sheathes being smooth and cylindrical. The leaves
Leaf
A leaf is an organ of a vascular plant, as defined in botanical terms, and in particular in plant morphology. Foliage is a mass noun that refers to leaves as a feature of plants....
are about 5 mm wide and hairless. Meadow Foxtail has a cylindrical inflorescence
Inflorescence
An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Strictly, it is the part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed and which is accordingly modified...
, with glumes about 5–10 mm wide and spikelets
Raceme
A raceme is a type of inflorescence that is unbranched and indeterminate and bears pedicellate flowers — flowers having short floral stalks called pedicels — along the axis. In botany, axis means a shoot, in this case one bearing the flowers. In a raceme, the oldest flowers are borne...
about 4–6 mm long.
The ligule
Ligule
A ligule — is a thin outgrowth at the junction of leaf and leafstalk of many grasses and sedges or a strap-shaped corolla, such as that of a ray floret in plants in the daisy family....
is 1 to 2.5 mm long, with a slightly tattered top.
Similarity to other grassland species
Alopecurus pratensis has two common relatives Marsh Foxtail Alopecurus geniculatusAlopecurus geniculatus
Alopecurus geniculatus is a species of grass known by the common name water foxtail or Marsh foxtail.It is native to much of Eurasia and North America, where it grows in moist areas. This is a perennial grass forming bunches of erect stems up to about 60 centimeters in maximum height. The leaves...
and Black Grass Alopecurus myosuroides
Alopecurus myosuroides
Alopecurus myosuroides is an annual grass, found on cultivated and waste land. It is also known as Slender Meadow Foxtail, Black-Grass, Twitch Grass, Black Twitch.-Description:...
.
However It is usually confused with Timothy-grass
Timothy-grass
Timothy-grass , is an abundant perennial grass native to most of Europe except for the Mediterranean region. It grows to 50–150 cm tall, with leaves up to 45 cm long and 1 cm broad. The flowerhead is 7–15 cm long and 8–10 mm broad, with densely packed spikelets...
Phleum Pratense. Timothy flowers later from June until August. The spikelets of Timothy are twin horn like projections arranged in cylindrical panicle
Panicle
A panicle is a compound raceme, a loose, much-branched indeterminate inflorescence with pedicellate flowers attached along the secondary branches; in other words, a branched cluster of flowers in which the branches are racemes....
s, foxtail has a soft, single awn
Awn
In botany, an awn is either a hair- or bristle-like appendage on a larger structure, or in the case of the Asteraceae, a stiff needle-like element of the pappus....
.
Ecology
The caterpillarCaterpillar
Caterpillars are the larval form of members of the order Lepidoptera . They are mostly herbivorous in food habit, although some species are insectivorous. Caterpillars are voracious feeders and many of them are considered to be pests in agriculture...
s of some Lepidoptera
Lepidoptera
Lepidoptera is a large order of insects that includes moths and butterflies . It is one of the most widespread and widely recognizable insect orders in the world, encompassing moths and the three superfamilies of butterflies, skipper butterflies, and moth-butterflies...
use it as a foodplant, e.g. the Essex Skipper
Essex Skipper
The Essex Skipper is a butterfly of the Hesperiidae family. In North America, it is known as the European Skipper....
(Thymelicus lineola). Additionally, male mosquitos can often be found on this flower drinking the nectar.
