Southern Wetland Flora
Field Office Guide to Plant Species
Andropogon virginicus L.
- Family: Grass (Poaceae)
- Flowering: August-November
- Field Marks: Broom-sedge has a sessile spikelet shorter than the adjacent stalk. The racemes curve gracefully, and the flowering spikes are not as thick as in Andropogon glomeratus.
- Habitat:Moist to dry soils in old fields, pastures, prairies, glades.
- Habit: Tufted perennial grass with short rhizomes.
- Stems: Upright, branched, usually smooth, up to 4 feet tall.
- Leaves: Elongated, narrow, up to 1 1/2 feet long, up to 1/6 inch wide, rough to the touch above, smooth below; sheaths densely hairy.
- Flowers: Borne in paired spikelets; one member of the pair sessile and with both stamens and pistils, the other reduced to a stalk; spikelets many in curved racemes; branches of the racernes with long, silky hairs.
- Sepals: 0.
- Petals: 0.
- Stamens: 1-3.
- Pistils: Ovary superior.
- Notes: This species, unpalatable when mature to grazing livestock, forms conspicuous orange-brown tufts in pastures.
Previous Species -- Bushy Bluestem (Andropogon glomeratus)
Return to Species List -- Group 2
Next Species -- Pineland Three-awn Grass (Aristida stricta)
