Scientific Name
Dactylis glomerata L.
Common Name(s)
Orchardgrass
Tribe / Family Name
Poeae
Flowering Period
June to August
Symbol
DAGL
Description
Orchardgrass is an introduced cool-season perennial bunchgrass that rarely produces short rhizomes; reproduction occurs from seeds and tillers. Culms range up to 210 cm in height. Its inflorescence is a narrow to open panicle 4–20 cm long with dense spikelets grouped together in one-sided fascicles on each branch and typically pyramidal. Spikelets are 5–8 mm long, oblong-obovoid, subsessile, compressed, 2- to 6-flowered, and awned (the glume and lemma awns up to 2 mm long). Ligules are up to 11 mm long, membranous, obtuse to truncate, erose to lacerate, and glabrous.
General Info
Orchardgrass can be found in open fields, pastures, and meadows, along ditch banks, roadsides, and trail sides, as well as in foothills and forest openings.
Similar Species
Orchardgrass is a distinctive grass and not usually confused with other grasses.
Picture of growth habit.
Inflorescence is a narrow to open panicle.
Close-up picture of spikelet.
Close-up picture of ligule.
Illustration of orchardgrass. USDA-NRCS PLANTS Database / Hitchcock, A.S. (rev. A. Chase). 1950. <i>Manual of the grasses of the United States.</i> USDA Miscellaneous Publication No. 200. Washington, DC.