Western Wetland Flora
Field Office Guide to Plant Species
Distichlis stricta (Torr.) Scribn.
- Family: Grass (Gramineae)
- Flowering: May-August
- Field Marks: This grass is distinguished by its 5- to 15-flowered spikelets that are unisexual, with the two sexes borne on separate plants, and by its sod-forming habit in salty and alkaline areas.
- Habitat: Salt marshes, alkaline flats, along roads.
- Habit: Perennial grass from extensive, much branched rhizomes.
- Stems: Mat-forming, but with ascending stems up to 15 inches tall, smooth, stiff.
- Leaves: Narrow, elongated, flat to rolled into a tube, long-tapering to the tip, up to 1/8 inch wide, rough to the touch.
- Flowers: 5-15 flowers in a spikelet, with male flowers in separate spikelets on separate plants from the female; spikelets many in a short panicle up to 3 inches long; each spikelet up to 3/4 inch long; glumes and lemmas straw-colored, without a
- Sepals: 0.
- Petals: 0.
- Stamens: 3.
- Pistils: Ovary superior.
- Grains: Smooth.
- Notes: The female plants usually have shorter stems than the male plants. There is disagreement as to whether this plant is specifically different from D. spicata.
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