Species

Nassella trichotoma

Common Name(s)

Nassella tussock

Authority

Nassella trichotoma (Nees) Arechav.

Family

Poaceae

Flora Category

Vascular - Exotic

NVS Species Code

NASTRI

The National Vegetation Survey (NVS) Databank is a physical archive and electronic databank containing records of over 94,000 vegetation survey plots - including data from over 19,000 permanent plots. NVS maintains a standard set of species code abbreviations that correspond to standard scientific plant names from the Ngä Tipu o Aotearoa - New Zealand Plants database.

Structural Class

Grasses

Habitat

Terrestrial.

Features

Caespitose perennial with shoots swollen and white at base, and open purplish panicle, branching intravaginal. Sheath to 5cm, scabrid near ligule and on upper margins, becoming glabrous below. Ligule to 1.5mm, decurrent, symmetrical or asymmetrical, rounded or apiculate, short-hairy or scabrid. Leaf-blade to 35cm x .5mm diam., inrolled, appearing terete, very stiff, acicular, abaxially antrorsely scabrid, adaxially clothed in short dense hairs; margins smooth. Culm to 70cm, glabrous except for hairs above and below nodes. Panicle to 25cm, open, much-branched, drooping, at maturity readily detaching with culm and blowing freely; rachis, branches and pedicels scabrid. Glumes nearly equal, 5~8mm, deeply purple-suffused, 3-nerved, produced into awn approx. 2mm, nerves and margins stiff-hairy. Lemma to 2.5mm, 5-nerved, gibbous, tubercular-scabrid except on margin, lobes short, apiculate; coma present; awn tardily caducous to 35mm, weakly 1-geniculate, short stiff-hairy, column loosely twisted, to 15mm, arista to 20mm. Palea approx. 1mm, completely enclosed by lemma, glabrous, hyaline, weakly bifid at apex. Callus to .3mm, blunt, hairs to 1.5mm. Lodicules 2, to 1mm in chasmogamous flowers, to .6mm in cleistogamous flowers. Anthers penicillate, in chasmogamous flowers to 2mm; in cleistogamous flowers 1 fertile anther to .7mm, and 2 aborted anthers to .3mm. (Edgar & Connor, 2000)

Similar Taxa

Finely serrated leaves give a rough feeling to the leaves. Fine feathery panicle with a purplish tinge.

Flowering

October, November, December

Fruiting

October-December

Year Naturalised

1931

Origin

S. America

Reason for Introduction

Accidental

Life Cycle and Dispersal

Perennial. Reproduces by seed only. Dispersed by wind, up to 16km from the mother plant. The seeds, aided by the roughened seed coat and the tufts of hairs at the base, also cling to wool, bags, clothing etc. Seeds are also spread on machinery, in hay, mud and the droppings of animals.

This page last updated on 15 Aug 2014