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- Poaceae - grass family
All images on this website have been taken in Leicestershire and Rutland by NatureSpot members. We welcome new contributions - just register and use the Submit Records form to post your photos. Click on any image below to visit the species page. The RED / AMBER / GREEN dots indicate how easy it is to identify the species - see our Identification Difficulty page for more information. A coloured rating followed by an exclamation mark denotes that different ID difficulties apply to either males and females or to the larvae - see the species page for more detail.
Grasses, Rushes & Sedges
These four families of plants are often grouped together because of their similarities - all are monocotyledons and have wind-pollinated flowers. Leaves, when present, are long and narrow with parallel veins. Because they are not pollinated by insects, their flowers lack petals, scent or other features that attract insects; flowers are often greenish or brownish, and botanists use different terms to describe various flower-parts of grasses and sedges. There is more on this under the family headings. Detailed examination these flower-parts is often needed to identify a species.
Identification resources
See our Recording Trees, Wildflowers & Grasses page for guidance on how to record. Grasses, rushes and sedges are not usually included in wildflower field-guides, so you may need to refer to a different book or identification resource.
More on recording in Leicestershire and Rutland and contacts for our County Recorders are on the webpage of our local VC55 branch of the BSBI.
Video: Key Features of Grasses Useful for Identification (Russell Parry, VC55 BSBI County Recorder) https://youtu.be/Xe6ZYYZqTmw
Video: Two Increasingly Common City Grasses (Russell Parry, VC55 BSBI County Recorder) https://youtu.be/sDTjBdE1Sb4
Field guides:
- Price, D. 2015. A Field Guide to Grasses, Sedges and Rushes (Species Recovery Trust)
- Gardener & Roberts. 2010. Guide to Common grasses. FSC. One of the popular and inexpensive FSC fold-out guides, illustrating some of the commoner species.
- Rose, F. 1989. Colour Identification Guide to the Grasses, Sedges, Rushes and Ferns of the British Isles and North-Western Europe. (Viking). A companion to the popular Wildflower Key
- Hubbard, C.E. 1992. Grasses: A Guide to Their Structure, Identification, Uses and Distribution in the British Isles. (Penguin).
- Cope, T. & Gray, A. 2009. Grasses of the British Isles (BSBI) - available as an e-book as well as a physical book - see BSBI Handbooks
- Jermy, A.C et al. 2007. Sedges - 3rd edition (BSBI) - available as an e-book as well as a physical book - see BSBI Handbooks
- McDougall, E. A vegetative key to Grasses (Bristol ERC). Available from the BSBI - see their Grass ID webpages
- Davis, B N K. 2008. A Field Key to Grasses of the East Midlands (Huntingdon Flora & Fauna Society) may be useful if you can find a copy.
Poaceae - grass family
Special terms are used by botanists to describe a grass - see Ken Adams' very helpful diagram of the different parts of a grass plant and flower.
Grasses have hollow cylindrical (occasionally flattened) flowering stems or 'culms' with thickened nodes; they are never 3-angled as sedges. Leaves are alternate, flattened, sometimes rolled or folded along the axis, with a sheathing leaf base wrapped around or enclosing the stem. At the junction of the leaf-blade and leaf-sheath there is usually a 'ligule', a membraneous flap, sometimes with side extension or 'auricles'; these can be a useful identification feature.
The flowers are green, yellowish, pinkish or brownish, arranged in spikelets with two bract-like structures - the upper and lower 'glumes' - at the base. Spikelets may be loose or compact, with a single floret or many florets in each, arising from a central 'rhachilla'. The individual florets are very reduced in form; a key identification feature is the shape and texture of the outer 'lemma' and sometimes the inner 'palea' that encloses the stamens and stigmas. Short or long, straight or bent whisker-like 'awns' may arise from the back or tip of the lemma or glumes.
Identification can be vey difficult and involves close examination of the various parts of the flower and spikelet, plus details of leaves, auricles and ligule. It is helpful to photograph these parts in close-up, but the texture of leaves, culms, lemmas, spikelets, rhachilla can be important too - i.e. is it rough, smooth, soft, coarse, hairy, minutely toothed, prickly, etc.? It can be helpful to use your lower lip detect this. The overall growth and form of the plant and the habitat in which it is found are also important aids to identification, and therefore a photo of the whole grass in its habitats is also needed.
Perennial grasses spread by producing rhizomes (underground stems) or stolons (over-ground stems) which root at the tip or along their length. Perennial plants produce sterile leafy shoots called 'tillers' as well as the fertile flowering 'culms'. To identify some species, you will need to work out if they are annual or perennial, rhizomatous or stoloniferous.
Our native grasses are all herbaceous annuals or perennials, but the Bamboos are woody perennial plants.