Black Bent - Agrostis gigantea

A tall grass, reaching up to 150 cm with creeping underground rhizomes and flat furrowed leaves. Spreading in flower and in fruit.

Common Bent (Agrostis capillaris) and Creeping Bent (Agrostis stolonifera)

This is usually a tall and robust grass, often close to 1 metre tall with some leaves at least 5mm wide or more, but it can be much shorter. Ligules of upper tiller leaves longer than wide (as with A stolonifera); rarely with stolons.  Panicle branches remain spreading after flowering, unlike A stolonifera, where the panicle contracts after flowering.

The County Recorder has asked for a specimen of this plant to be retained for verification

Arable land and damp woodland.

June to August.

Perennial.

Fairly frequent in most of Britain but scarcer in some northern areas.

Fairly frequent in Leicestershire and Rutland. In the 1979 Flora survey of Leicestershire it was found in 210 of the 617 tetrads.

In the current checklist (Jeeves 2011) it is listed as occasional, but probably under-recorded