Hairy-brome - Bromopsis ramosa

Alternative names
Hairy Brome
Description

Tufted and erect to 150 cm tall. With broad (6 to 16 mm) drooping, hairy leaves. Stems are erect and hairy, bearing loose, nodding panicles 15 to 40 cm long, their drooping branches arising in pairs each bearing 5 to 9 spikelets which are 20 to 40 mm long, linear and compressed.

Similar Species

Schedonorus (Festuca) gigantea and Brachypodium sylvaticum are superficially similar plants that grow in woodlands and shaded places

Identification difficulty
ID checklist (your specimen should have all of these features)

Leaf-sheaths have pointed auricles; lower sheaths with long soft down-pointed hairs; panicle with pendent branches when mature

Recording advice

Photograph all the plant, including leaf-sheaths and panicle - it can't be verified from a picture of the flowers alone

Habitat

Woods and shaded places on richer soils.

When to see it

July and August.

Life History

Perennial.

UK Status

Common nationally, particularly in the south and east of England, less common in the north and west.

VC55 Status

Common in Leicestershire and Rutland. In the 1979 Flora survey of Leicestershire it was found in 421 of the 617 tetrads.

Leicestershire & Rutland Map

MAP KEY:

Yellow squares = NBN records (all known data)
Coloured circles = NatureSpot records: 2020+ | 2015-2019 | pre-2015

UK Map

Species profile

Common names
Hairy-brome
Species group:
Grasses, Rushes & Sedges
Kingdom:
Plantae
Order:
Poales
Family:
Poaceae
Records on NatureSpot:
22
First record:
11/05/1992 (John Mousley;Steve Grover)
Last record:
10/08/2023 (Nicholls, David)

Total records by month

% of records within its species group

10km squares with records

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