 Photo ©
Carl Farmer |
Common in saltmarshes and bare ground in estuaries. Spikelets 7-12 mm Skye ID: Characterised by often having a few panicle branches sticking out stiffly at irregular angles. Even when the branches spread, their side-branches and individual spikelets seem to remain appressed to the branches. Branches 2-3 together. Spikelets similar to Poa but parallel-sided. Glumes and lemmas have broad colourless margins. One glume much larger than the other and lemmas larger than both. No awns. 3-10 flowers per spikelet. Ligule short, 1-2 mm, but rounded, not cut off square like Red Fescue, another saltmarsh grass which can look similar but has awned lemmas. Other features: Forms dense tufts on bare mud or muddy shingle, trapping debris from the tide with its creeping stems to build up a soil and eventually making a continuous saltmarsh turf. |
