Dwarf Feather Grass

This is a widespread species yielding good forage in the steppe zone when young. After the fruiting heads appear the sharp calluses can cause damage to cattle.

Also collected (unlocalised) in Chitral. 3000-4000m.

Perennial, densely tufted. Culms 40–80 cm tall, often 4-noded, lower nodes concealed. Leaf sheaths smooth or slightly scabrid, lower longer than internodes; leaf blades convolute, basal blades up to 40 cm, outer surface smooth or scabrid; ligule lanceolate, of basal leaves 1–1.5 mm, of culm leaves 3–10 mm. Panicle narrow, 10–25 cm or more, base enclosed by expanded uppermost leaf sheath. Spikelets yellowish green or gray-white; glumes narrowly lanceolate, 2.5–3.5 cm, apex filiform; callus pungent, 2–3 mm; lemma 9–12 mm, shortly hairy in longitudinal lines, smooth and glabrous toward apex; awn deciduous, 11–19 cm, scabrid, 2-geniculate, column 3.5–5 cm to first bend, ca. 1.5 cm to second bend, bristle curling, ca. 10 cm. Fl. and fr. Jun–Aug.

Tufted perennial (20-)55-110 cm high. Leaf-blades involute and setaceous, 1-2 mm wide when flattened, glabrous to faintly scaberulous on the lower (outer) surface; ligule 3.5-17 mm long. Panicle narrow, contracted but not dense, 10-25 (-40) cm long, partially enclosed in the inflated sheath of the uppermost leaf. Glumes subequal, lanceolate and long-acuminate, 25-35 mm long, the lower 3-nerved, the upper 5-nerved; lemma ± terete, 10-14 mm long (including callus), hairy with the hairs in several straight lines, glabrous at the tip; callus acuminate, pungent, 2.5-4 mm long. Awn bigeniculate, articulated at the base, 12-18 cm long, scabrid throughout.

Temperate Europe, Mediterranean region, Asia, China.

N Gansu, Hebei, Shanxi, N Xinjiang [Kashmir, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan; SW Asia, Europe].

Distribution: Pakistan (N.W.F.P., Gilgit & Kashmir); Mediterranean region eastwards through southern USSR and the Himalayas to China and Japan.

4000 m

Fl. & Fr. Per.: July-September.

Mountain valleys, plains, rocky slopes; 500–2300 m.

Stipa capillata is a perennial bunchgrass species in the family Poaceae, native to Europe and Asia.