Vulpia myuros
rat-tail six-weeks grass, rattail fescue
blades 2.4–10.5(17)cm × 0.4–3 mm, usually glabrous.
dense panicles or spike-like racemes 3–25 × 0.5–1.5(2) cm, often enclosed in the uppermost leaf sheath at maturity; pulvini absent;
branches usually appressed to ascending.
5–12 mm, 3–7 florets.
glabrous;
lower glumes 0.5–2 mm, 20–50% as long as the upper glumes; (except occasionally on the uppermost spikelet of a branch);
upper glumes 2.5–5.5 mm.
fusiform, 3–5 mm, glabrous.
4.5–7 mm, 5-veined, usually scabrous distally, glabrous but the margins sometimes strongly ciliate;
lemma awns 5–15(22) mm.
0.5– 1(2)mm.
=42.
Vulpia myuros
Disturbed sites with well-drained soil. 0–1700 m. BW, Casc, Col, CR, ECas, Est, Lava, Sisk, WV. CA, ID, NV, WA; scattered throughout North America; North Africa, Europe. Exotic.
With its narrow panicles, V. myuros closely resembles V. bromoides, but the latter species has lower glumes at least half as long as the upper glumes and consistently dense inflorescences with individual spikelets that are hard to distinguish. Some V. myuros plants have dense inflorescences like V. bromoides, but others have looser inflorescences with the individual spikelets easily visible. Plants with strongly ciliate lemmas have been called V. megalura, but there seems to be no other trait distinguishing them from typical V. myuros.
Barbara Wilson, Richard Brainerd, Nick Otting
- Local floras:
BC, 
OR, 
WA - Local Web sites:
Flora NW, 
PNW Herbaria 
WildflowerSearch
iNaturalist (observations)
USDA Plants Database- LBJ Wildflower Center
- SEINet
- Plants of the World Online
- Encyclopedia of Life
- Wikipedia
- Google Image Search
