Bromus tectorum
Environmental Weed (2024)
Common names
cheatgrass
Biostatus
Exotic
Category
Vascular
Structural class
Grasses
Detailed description
Small, green to bluish-green, annual grass to 20–90 cm tall. All parts softly hairy. Stems slender, erect or spreading. Leaves 30–160 × 2–4 mm, flat, velvety; emerging leaf rolled; sheath tubular, soon splitting, usually with purplish tinge. Ligule 2–5 mm long, membranous, frayed, whitish. Seeding stem to 1 m long, drooping to one side; panicle dense, soft, usually purplish. Seed spikelets narrow, 20–35 mm long (incl awns 10–17 mm), 2–3 mm wide. Seeds narrow, Spring–Summer.
Similar taxa
Shorter than B. hordeaceus, and has taller narrower spikelets.
Habitat
Terrestrial.
Conservation status
Not applicable
Detailed taxonomy
Family
Poaceae
Ecology
Flowering
April–May
Fruiting
May–June
Year naturalised
1870
Origin
Mediterranean, Europe, N Asia
Reason for introduction
Agricultural
Life cycle and dispersal
Annual.
Other information
Etymology
bromus: From the ancient Greek word bromos, referring to a kind of oat
Environmental Weed (2024)
This plant is named in a list of 386 environmental weeds in New Zealand 2024 prepared by DOC. 759 candidate species were considered for inclusion on this new comprehensive list of environmental weeds in New Zealand. The species considered were drawn from published lists of weed species, lists of plants that must be reported or managed by law if observed, existing national and regional programmes and agreements for pest management, and species already managed by the Department of Conservation (DOC). Candidate species were then assessed to see if they were fully naturalised and whether they have more than minor impacts in natural ecosystems. Read the full report here.
NVS code
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.
BROTEC
Referencing and citations
References and further reading
Wax LM, Fawcett RS, Isley D, eds. 1981. Weeds of the North Central States. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign College of Agriculture, Illinois, USA. 303 p.