Common Bent (Agrostis capillaris)
A low-growing, 20 to 50 cm tall, perennial grass, tufted with creeping rhizomes but no leafy stolons. Abundant and widely found in permanent grassland throughout the UK and Europe, from sea level to mountain tops, particularly in nutrient poor upland areas. Cultivated for use in lawn grasses especially for short fine turf, found on dry to damp ground in neutral to acidic soils, occurring in neutral grassland as well as acid grassland swards. Also found as part of heath, woodland/scrub and sand dune habitats as well as on post-industrial sites.
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It forms a dense sward of quite fine leaves, hairless, dull, slightly shiny below and short, that taper almost directly from the ligule down to the finely pointed tip and are distinctly ribbed. Youngest leaf rolled. Blades of the culm-leaves are flat, 1.5-4.0mm wide and often have the twist on the leaf as an extension of their rolled growth within the culm. The ligule is short or absent (up to 2 mm), and membranous and does not come to a point (unlike creeping bent). The tiller ligule is shorter than wide. Auricles are absent.
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The flowering panicle becomes evident from May to June, is between 8-18cm, and is finely branched with numerous very small spikelets forming a reddish-purplish brown haze over the mat of leaves. Flowers June to August. The open and always spreading panicle, even after flowering, with whorled branches, distinguishes this from the similarly fine creeping bent. Each spikelet contains only one floret usually completely enclosed by its glumes, and the small spikelets, which are not awned, make flowering fescue and meadowgrass (Poa spp.) look very clumpy by comparison. After seeds have been shed, the bare panicles usually persist all winter. Germinates spring to autumn.
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It is strongly associated with other species such as Red Fescue (Festuca rubra), Sheep's Fescue (F. ovina), Sheep's Fescue (Anthoxanthum odoratum), Sweet Vernal-grass (Holcus lanatus), Yorkshire Fog, (Plantago lanceolata), Ribwort Plantain (Hypochaeris radicata), Cat's ear and Harebell (Campanula rotundifolia).
As well as being highly resistent to grazing and tolerant of wear, Common Bent is also cold and drought tolerant, making it well adapted as an early coloniser of extremely dry habitats such as wasteland or spoil heaps. Common Bent reproduces largely through outbreeding and seed set from August onwards. Seeds germinate both in the autumn and in the spring, forming a persistent seed bank.
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Cocksfoot (Dactilis glomerata)
A Member of the Poaceae Family of Grasses, Cocksfoot grass is perennial and commonly grows in dense tussocks which can be 20–140cm tall. Cocksfoot grass is native to Europe, Asia and North Africa and is grown for hay and as a grazing plant for livestock. It was very popular in the 18th century for its drought resistance and improvement of soil condition by increasing humus content. It is a common grass in meadows and along roadsides across the UK, and though present throughout the year, it is best seen from June to September when flowering. The clumped flowers and seed heads are said to resemble a cock's foot, hence the name.
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​Cocksfoot is very persistent perennial and is suitable for between 2-10 years. A densely tufted, dark bluish green species, that can grow above 1 metre in height and can create tussocks, if unmanaged. It is palatable but should be grazed or cut frequently to remain vegetative and leafy. It grows early in the spring and has a comprehensive root structure travelling to depth and therefore thrives on light, free-draining soil. It is equally at home on soils prone to flooding and is extremely tolerant to frost. There are generally few pest and disease problems with cocksfoot, although rust can creep in towards the end of the autumn.
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Each leaf has a prominent keel with long flat leaves that are 2-15mm wide and that narrow to a point. The white ligules can be long (2-10mm) with finely toothed, torn edges. The leaf sheaths are strongly compressed often described as 'folded'
Its key characteristic is a flattened stem base which separates this grass from others.
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The flowering season is June to September The panicle is a distinctive, dense, tufted, triangular, one sided mass of spikelets, 10-50cm long. The flowers are bluish purple in colour early in the season or red- to purple-tinged (usually green in shade, redder in full sun), turning pale grey-brown at seed maturity. The spikelets are 5–9 millimetres long, typically containing two to five flowers.
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The seedhead is dense and spiky when first emerging, becoming open and branched as it matures. Seeds are very small, with more than a million per kilogram. This is a light seed, which is narrow and thin in shape. It has a smooth and papery texture and an overall beige to pale yellow colour. It is 4mm in length.
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Cocksfoot is important for wildlife by harbouring insects and is a good choice in a seed mix, for this reason alone.
Being a wind pollinated plant, it produces pollen only and although normally grass pollen is not sought after by bees, it has been observed at Kew Gardens that Honeybees will favour this pollen above others from many flowers which are available at the same time, which was a surprise to many. Bumblebees benefit from areas of long grass, as they build their nests in the ground in long grass, such as the moss carder bee (Bombus muscorum), brown-banded carder bee (Bombus humilis), and often using old mouse holes are red-shanked carder bees (Bombus ruderarius).
The caterpillars of many butterfly species feed on cock’s foot, including:
Meadow Brown (Maniola jurtina),
Wall Brown (Lasiommata megera),
Gatekeeper (Pyronia tithonus),
Large Skipper (Ochlodes venata),
Essex Skipper (Thymelicus lineola),
Small Skipper (Thymelicus sylvestris),
Zabulon Skipper (Poanes zabulon),
Speckled Wood (Pararge aegeria),
When grown with red clover it is very good at suppressing weeds. It’s an ideal companion grass for legumes in mixed permanent pastures (Ecocrop, 2010). It is suitable for mixed sowing with red clover (Trifolium pratense) for hay or white clover (Trifolium repens) for grazing (Sanada et al., 2010), though competes with white clover for water and nutrients, where the two species are grown together, with cocksfoot dominant pastures having lower nutritional value and being difficult to manage by grazing (Mills, 2007).
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Yorkshire Fog (Holcus lanatus)
Yorkshire fog is probably the most widely distributed native grass in the British Isles, being able to grow in almost every habitat where grass can grow. It is found in a wide range of grasslands, including hay meadows, pastures, chalk and limestone grassland, and also occurring in hedge banks, open woodland and moorland. It grows in dry to winter-wet, acidic to calcareous soils. it is most prolific on fertile ground which is mildly acidic, moist with impeded drainage but not permanently waterlogged.
It is a tufted softly hairy perennial of the family Poaceae and is of medium height and vigour up to one metre tall and can be seen throughout the year. It has a woolly appearance with flower heads tinged with purple to red and soft seed heads of grey to pink. ​It spreads vegetatively by developing new shoots and roots at its nodes. Plants form a blanket of runners on the soil surface. Semi-prostrate rosettes of shoots known as 'mops' may form at the end of the runners. These mops root readily in contact with moist soil. In good growing conditions, where conditions favour Yorkshire fog it has the potential to be a competitive plant and a tendency to produce a lush, loose smothering mass of lush growth which is then prone to collapse. This plant can be commonly seen in agricultural pasture although older plants are often inedible to cows and sheep, therefore having little value as a fodder grass and is regarded as a weed in meadows, pastures and lawns. It is not however avoided by livestock and is not difficult to mow with a scythe or make hay from.
Individual plants are however comparatively short -lived, and have a limited capacity to spread laterally; rigorous mowing to remove surplus growth can help restore balance by allowing other longer lived grasses to fill out and replace it. Its capacity to regenerate effectively in any gaps from seed however does means that it is difficult to eradicate completely; once present it is likely to persist at some level.​ It is tolerant of a range of soil pH, but grows best between 5.0 and 7.5. It exhibits climatic tolerance over a wide altitude range, but severe frosts can kill it. It does not survive trampling and puddling. It can be controlled in some locations by increasing the available potassium and phosphorus, increasing stock, and improving drainage.
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It has flat wide soft pale green or grey-green leaves with hairs that make them look and feel velvety soft.
The stems are round, softly hairy, erect, often tufted from the base and can grow up to one metre high. The bases of the stems are white with pink stripes or veins. The ligule is 1–4 millimetres long, blunt, and hairy.
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Its flower heads too are soft, pale-green and often with a pink or purple tint and can be quite attractive. From May to August a compound panicle (a loose branching cluster of flowers) with crowded, single spikelets grows on the end of the stalk. The flowers are wind-pollinated and usually out-crossing. The first seeds become viable 5 to 9 days after flowering and all are viable after 20 days. The seeds are flattened, oval to tear-shaped with a surface that is shiny, grooved and hairy. Seeds are shed from in summer and early autumn. One panicle has 100 to 380 seeds. Yorkshire fog is naturally very efficient at colonising open ground from seed; either via dispersal from its prolific seed production or from the persistent bank of seed in the soil. It is rarely necessary to sow seed deliberately on sites where it might be ecologically appropriate as it is likely to regenerate naturally in more than adequate proportions. For this reason it often regarded as a weed (this combined with its competitive vigour and lack of value as a fodder grass).
Not to be confused with Creeping soft grass (Holcus mollis) which has a similar appearance but is often found in woodland habitats and has rhizomes and a creeping habit. ​This species can be distinguished from H. mollis by the beardless nodes on its culm, the absence of rhizomes, and the awn becoming hooked when dry and not projecting beyond the tips of the glumes. It has been known to hybridize with H. mollis, producing a male sterile hybrid with 2n = 21 chromosomes. Hybrids tend to resemble H. lanatus in their morphology.
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Yorkshire fog grass is a food plant for the caterpillars of the small skipper, Speckled Wood and Wall butterfly as well as other butterfly species. It is often grazed on by rabbits.
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Creeping Soft Grass (Holcus mollis)
H. mollis is a native that is very common throughout mainland Britain. A creeping, rhizomatous perennial, growing to 50 centimetres tall, found in Quercus and Betula woods, open conifer plantations, hedge banks, on heathland, usually with some shade, and under Bracken. Locally frequent on well-drained acidic or neutral soils. It is capable of spreading into damper grassland and is locally a troublesome weed of arable land. ​Holcus mollis is favoured by conditions in woodland clearings and at the early stages of coppicing. Growth and flowering are restricted as the tree canopy develops. It is often a relict of former woodland vegetation, surviving in open grassland and grassy heaths after woodland clearance despite being a shade lover. It is found mostly on moist, freely-drained acid soils, normally light to medium texture and high in organic matter; it is absent from areas of calcareous or base rich soil.
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Flat, soft, greenish leaves. Very similar to Holcus lanatus (Yorkshire Fog) and growing in similar habitats, this grass is easily distinguished by the smooth upper stem and bent nodes with a tuft of downward-pointing hairs and the presence of rhizomes.
Flowering in July-August with branched, downy flowerheads. It comprises of 2 flowered spikelets 4-6mm long, with an prominent curved awn visibly protruding from it, about 3-5 mm long.
Spreads by creeping rhizomes that occur around 5 cm deep in the soil or sometimes deeper. Rhizome growth occurs in the period May to November but is fastest from mid-June to mid-July. The rhizomes have many dormant buds that do not develop unless the rhizomes are disturbed and then fresh aerial shoots may arise from the broken fragments and form large stands. ​Each small piece of rhizome is capable of developing into a new plant. Research shows that within 6–8 inches of the surface, 1 square foot of rhizome infested soil may contain up to 110 feet of rhizome, the weight of roots and rhizomes being estimated at 7.5 tons per acre.
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H. mollis tolerates occasional mowing or light grazing but is a poor competitor with more vigorous grasses.
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A pentaploid variant of H. mollis is common in Britain; it is sterile but spreads vegetatively. H. mollis var. variegatus has striped green and white leaves; it is sometimes cultivated. A male sterile hybrid with Holcus lanatus exists with 2n = 21 chromosomes. Hybrids tend to resemble H. lanatus in their morphology.
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Annual Meadow Grass (Poa annua)
Annual meadow-grass is a familiar small, pale green, loosely tufted annual or short-lived perennial, very variable in size, 5–30cm. It is a pioneer species in disturbed habitats and is common throughout the UK. It is very common in all arable areas, but it does not thrive on very acid soils or those low in phosphate and can be found on waste ground, bare grassland and in lawns. It is sensitive to drought and is easily damaged by air pollution. ​Annual meadow-grass is favoured by improving the water holding capacity of soil with organic matter. It can withstand periodic waterlogging.
Annual meadow-grass is shade tolerant and can withstand considerable trampling. In fact it is one of the most wear resistant of all grasses. It is common in the headlands of arable fields where it is an important constituent in the diet of many farmland birds including gamebirds.
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In some situations, it can be considered a weed. ​It is one of the main weeds in grassland. In young swards it may account for up to 20% of the composition where establishment of desirable grasses has been poor. In older swards it invades areas damaged by poaching, intensive grazing or where other grasses have died out. It is considered a grassland weed because of its poor productivity and low digestability. Annual meadow-grass is also frequent weed in spring and autumn-sown arable crops and field vegetables. It is not particularly competitive, and although the plant is relatively small it can sometimes emerge in sufficient quantities to smother crop seedlings. It has become a problem in some localities due to its ability to germinate and set seed throughout the year. This low grass can grow from germination to seed production in six weeks!
Once established, it forms either a loose or compact erect, tufted plant and will flower within 44-55 days of germination. Because it flowers and seeds throughout the year, both emerging and flowering plants can sometimes be seen near each other. ​Annual meadow-grass is a very adaptable species and many ecotypes have been recognised, some of these are perennial. Annual forms have erect growth while the perennial ones form a mass of tillers many of which grow horizontally and root at the nodes. Many named varieties and subspecies are recognised. A perennial form has been bred for use in sports turf. Some populations of annual meadow-grass have developed resistance to certain widely used herbicides.
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5-30cm tall tufted or creeping, sprawling habit. It grows from a central base, to which all the shoots can be traced, and has a creeping rootstock. Perennial forms can spread vegetativily by creeping stems that root at the nodes but this is very limited.
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The blade-like leaves are light green with a boat-shaped tip, with the blade often crinkled or puckered and hairless. It is slightly keeled, with 'tramlines' and is folded in shoot. The ligule is medium, about 2-5mm. Roundly pointed and serrated. Auricles are absent.
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The yellow-green flowering head or panicle is clearly branched and spreading, with 1 to 4 spreading branches at each node, but only one or two branches at the lowest whorl, triangular in outline, 1-8cm long. The pale green sometimes, pink or purple flushed spikelets are small and contain two or more florets without awns. Lemmas easily seen extending beyond glume tips.
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Flowering is independent of day length and can occur at any time of year. It usually begins in May by the over wintering plants while plants from seedlings that emerge in spring flower from July throughout the growing season to September, with seeds becoming viable only 1-2 days following pollination, although, high temperatures can hinder anther development and this limits pollination.
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As a general rule the flowers are predominantly self-pollinated but up to 15% of outcrossing can occur. It can produce large numbers of seeds, with the seed number per inflorescence, estimated at 80 and the number per plant is said to average 2,050. The perennial forms are said to produce 13,000 seeds per plant. Annual meadow-grass will flower and set seed even when cut regularly to a height of 0.65 cm in short turf. Seed will continue to develop and ripen on inflorescences severed from the plant at any time after pollination. Annual meadow-grass can be found in fruit throughout the year. ​
Annual meadow-grass is a prolific seed producer but there is no obvious dispersal mechanism. Most seeds fall around the parent and being small soon become incorporated into the soil. The seeds are readily transported by human activity in mud by vehicular and foot traffic, by animals and birds, in water and on farm implements. It is also the most abundant weed seed to be found in soil on footwear. Viable seeds are often brought to the soil surface in wormcasts where conditions are more favourable for germination. Annual meadow-grass will also colonise molehills before being replace by perennial grasses. Mowing when the weed is in flower will spread the seeds. Viable seeds have been found in horse and cattle dung but viability is lost in manure after a period of storage.
Annual meadow-grass seed can form a major proportion of the weed seedbank in both arable and grassland soils. The seed can remain viable in soil for at least 4 years but losses are greater in cultivated soil. Seed mixed with soil and left undisturbed had declined by 76% after 6 years but in cultivated soil the loss was 92%. In soils sown with autumn crops and ploughed annually, the time to 99% decline of annual meadow-grass seed was calculated at 4.3 years with an annual decline rate of 55%. In undisturbed soil the annual loss was 46%. Dry-stored seed was still 98% viable after 3 years.
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A high proportion of seed will germinate soon after shedding. However, in the field, annual meadow-grass germinates from February to November with the main peaks of emergence from April through to September, the latter being the optimum time, possibly due to more reliable soil moisture. After this, as the temperature falls, germination also falls gradually. Seedling numbers and rate of emergence are affected by prevailing weather conditions. From the middle of February, germination increases with rising temperature. The minimum temperature for germination is 2-5 ËšC, optimising from around 7 ËšC, through to a high of 35 ËšC. Emergence also increases with increasing soil moisture (up to a maximum of 40% of field capacity), indicating that moisture retentive soils (including those with higher levels of organic matter) may be more prone to annual meadow-grass problems. Dry conditions however delay emergence. Seedlings may take around 20 days to achieve 50% emergence when moisture is available but dry conditions will delay emergence, particularly in the summer months. Plants that develop earlier in the year often grow larger and produced more tillers than those emerging later. Seedlings that emerge from August to December overwinter and begin to tiller when growth resumes in spring.
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Annual meadow-grass can be a host crop for the Shallot aphid (Myzus ascalonicus) and can become infected with Ergot (Claviceps purpurea) and in cereals may act as a source of crop infection throughout much of the year. The fungal fruiting bodies are smaller and less obvious on the grass flower panicle than on the cereal ear. It can be the host of a number of nematode species that also attack important crops.
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Perennial Rye Grass (Lolium perenne)
Perennial rye-grass is a tough native grass from the family Poaceae, that can be found on roadside verges, rough pastures and waste ground. Perennial rye-grass has been used since the early 17th century as a forage crop for livestock for silage, haylage, hay and grazing, it was once the most commonly sown grass in leys (fields used for grazing livestock) and is now often used for reseeding grasslands. It is native to Europe, Asia and northern Africa, but is widely cultivated and naturalised around the world. It has been the subject of plant breeding for over 60 years, ensuring there are a wide range of perennial ryegrass varieties available commercially.
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Perennial ryegrass is the most persistent ryegrass, lasting up to 6 years, after which, productivity may start to drop off and native weed grasses may creep into the sward. Perennial ryegrass will withstand most frosts throughout the winter. It lasts considerably longer than the higher yielding Italian and westerwolds ryegrasses. It’s flexible in use, because it can be grazed or cut and made into silage, haylage or hay later in the season. Many varieties are bred especially for their palatability and digestibility. Varieties that seed later in the season are best for grazing. Perennial ryegrass can be combined with several species. It works well with white clover, to create a more drought tolerant, higher protein grazing forage. New thinking on diverse systems is also including other species in perennial ryegrass swards such as chicory or plantain.
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Perennial Rye grass is dark green and glossy in appearance, forming dense tufts with fibrous roots, and can reach from 10-90cm in height.
Perennial Rye grass has narrow, blade-like leaves. The underside of the leaf is smooth and glossy, with the top side being slightly rougher, both are hairless with the younger leaf blades folded in sheath before they extend, unlike Italian Rye Grass which are rolled in the sheath.
Basal leaf sheaths are smooth, with the base of each culm pink to red in colour. The ligule is short, at up to 2 mm in length and blunt, and the auricles are small if present. Similar to common couch but has no rhizomes and the underside of the leaves are glossy.
It flowers from May through the summer to September, and can vary from being an annual plant to being very persistent year after year. Its flattened inflorescence can be from 4-30cm long, notably with awnless spikelets, unlike Italian rye-grass, which hold the flowers, they are arranged along opposite sides of the the stem in an alternating pattern. ​These are thin, narrow seeds which have a smooth, sometimes papery, shiny texture, and are about 5mm in length. The flower head may also be confused with couch grass. However, the spikelets of perennial rye-grass lie at 90° unlike couch where spikelets lie flat against the stem. Perennial rye-grass, as the name infers, is a perennial plant. Seeds germinate soon after falling to the ground and stems can vegetate.
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Modern plant breeding has produced tetraploid ryegrass varieties. With double the number of chromosomes of the standard diploid varieties, they have different characteristics. Tetraploid ryegrasses are highly palatable which leads to higher voluntary intakes and so are of great value in seeds mixtures, they can also be larger fleshier, high yielding plants. However, they tiller less than diploids and this means that they do not cover so much ground, leaving more soil showing. Nor are they as persistent. For these reasons, tetraploids should be favoured more in silage leys, where they contribute to yield. Late diploid varieties are normally the base of a long term grazing mixture. Generally intermediate ryegrass varieties head in the 3rd and 4th week of May. While late varieties head during the 1st and second weeks of June..
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Rye-grasses compete with a crop to roughly the same extent as sterile (or barren) brome and rough meadow-grass; other grasses, notably common couch, loose silky-bent and annual meadow-grass, are generally less competitive.
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