Description

Rescuegrass is a loosely cespitose or tufted cool-season annual, biennial, or perennial bunchgrass. In areas that have hot, dry summers and severe winter temperatures, it grows as an annual. It does not have creeping stolons or rhizomes; however, it has an extensive fibrous root system and tillers profusely.

Plants: Culms 19-1/2 to 47 inches tall, stout, solitary, erect, or geniculately ascending; leaf sheaths glabrous or densely pubescent; auricle absent; ligules less than 1/8 inch long, glabrous or pilose, obtuse, lacerate to erose; blades up to 1-1/2 to 12 inches long and 1/8 to 3/8 inch wide, flat, glabrous, or hairy on both surfaces.

Inflorescence/Spikelet/Floret: Flowers March to June; panicles 3-1/2 to 11 inches long, usually open, erect, or nodding; lower branches shorter than 4 inches, 1 to 4 per node, spreading or ascending, with up to 5 spikelets variously distributed; spikelets 5/8 to 1-1/2 inches long, shorter than at least some panicle branches, elliptic to lanceolate, strongly laterally compressed, not crowded or overlapping, with 4 to 12 florets; glumes smooth or scabrous, glabrous or pubescent, lower 1/4 to 1/2 inch long, 5 to 9 nerves, upper 5/16 to 5/8 inch long, 7 to 11 nerves, shorter than the lowest lemma; lemmas 7/16 to 3/4 inch long, lanceolate, laterally compressed, strongly keeled, usually glabrous, sometimes pubescent, smooth or scabrous, 9 to 13 nerves, nerves often raised and riblike, margins sometimes conspicuous, hyaline, whitish or partly purplish, apices entire or toothed, teeth acute, shorter than 1/16 inch; awns absent or to 3/8 inch.

Habitat

Cultivated and disturbed or degraded sites in desert and semidesert grassland communities, and roadsides within elevations that generally range below 4,500 feet.

Propagation/Phenology

Reproduces by seed.

Comments

Native to South America; rescuegrass has been widely introduced into the southern half of the U.S. as a forage crop. Rescuegrass is able to survive in a variety of different habitats and can tolerate cold temperatures and drought conditions. These characteristics make it difficult to manage. Rescuegrass has excellent forage quality. This species generally occurs as a weed in wildland areas of the Southwestern Region rather than as an invasive plant.