Description: This native grass is a summer annual about 1½–4' tall. Multiple culms are usually produced from the base that are sprawling, ascending, or erect. Each culm is green, glabrous, and terete; it is mostly hidden by the sheaths of the alternate leaves. The leaf blades are up to 1½' long and 1" across, although they are usually smaller in size. Each leaf blade is light to medium green, narrowly lanceolate, and hairless on both sides. The sheath of each leaf is light green to medium green, terete to somewhat flattened, and usually hairless; sometimes the upper portion of the sheath is slightly pubescent. The ligules are undeveloped, while the nodes of the culms are slightly swollen and often reddish.
Each culm terminates in a panicle of
floral racemes up to 8" long and about half as much across; the central stalk
of the panicle is light green, angular, and barely exerted from the uppermost
leaf at its base. The floral racemes alternate on either side of the central
stalk; they are slightly curved inward and become smaller as they ascend the
stalk. Each raceme has dense clusters of spikelets along one side (usually
facing upward or outward); these spikelets are green and ovoid in shape. Each
spikelet consists of 2 glumes, 2 lemmas, and a floret. The first glume is about
1 mm. and broadly ovate, while the second glume and sterile outer lemma are
about 3 mm. long and ovate. Both the second glume and sterile lemma are
appressed together, hiding the fertile lemma and its floret. The outer surfaces
of the second glume and sterile lemma have several longitudinal nerves that are
slender and dark green; each nerve has a row of bristly hairs, while the
surface between the nerves is light green and hairless to slightly pubescent.
In this variety of Barnyard Grass, the tips of the second glume and sterile
lemma are slender and pointed; sometimes the sterile lemma has an awn up to 3
mm. long. Each floret has a pair of pale purple plumose stigmas and 3 stamens.
The blooming period can occur from mid-summer into the fall. Each spikelet
produces a single grain. This grain is about 2.5 mm. long, ovoid, rather
flattened, and tapering to a point at both ends. The root system is fibrous.
This grass spreads by reseeding itself. At favorable sites, it can form
substantial colonies.
Cultivation:
The preference is full to partial sun, wet to moist conditions, and a fertile
loamy soil. The seeds germinate only after the weather has become warm.
Barnyard Grass tolerates mesic conditions and less fertile soil, but the size
of individual plants will be reduced.
Range & Habitat: This variety of Barnyard Grass
is common and can be found in every county of Illinois (see
Distribution
Map); it is almost as common as the awned variety of Barnyard Grass,
Echinochloa muricata muricata. Habitats include muddy borders of ponds
and rivers (in both sunny and partially shaded areas), mud flats, seasonal
wetlands that dry up during the summer, prairie sloughs, cropland and abandoned
fields, gardens, construction sites, ditches along roadsides and railroads, and
waste areas. Disturbed areas are preferred. This grass can survive severe
degradation of a wetland area; it also occurs at surprisingly dry sites with a
history of disturbance.
Faunal
Associations: The caterpillars of the skippers Lerodea eufala
(Eufala Skipper) and Polites mystic (Long Dash) feed on the foliage of
Echinochloa spp. (Barnyard Grasses). The seedheads are an important
source of food to many species of birds, especially dabbling ducks, during the
fall (see the Bird Table
for a listing of these species). Barnyard Grass is edible to cattle, although
high nitrates in the foliage may cause bloat if it is eaten in quantity.
Muskrats feed on the plants to a limited extent.
Photographic Location: Along a sidewalk on the
campus of the University of Illinois at Urbana, Illinois.
Comments:
Barnyard Grass has an unstable taxonomic history. The awnless variety of
Barnyard Grass, Echinochloa muricata wiegandii, as described here, has
the following scientific synonyms: Echinochloa pungens wiegandii,
Echinochloa crus-galli mitis, and Echinochloa muricata
occidentalis. The typical variety of native Barnyard Grass, Echinochloa
muricata muricata, and the introduced species of Barnyard Grass,
Echinochloa crus-galli, have sterile lemmas with awns about 5–15
mm. in length. Otherwise, they are quite similar in appearance to awnless
varieties of Barnyard Grass. An uncommon awnless variety of Barnyard Grass,
Echinochloa muricata microstachya, has purple spikelets, otherwise it is
difficult to distinguish from var. wiegandii (which has green
spikelets). A closely related awnless species, Echinochloa frumentacea
(Billion Dollar Grass), also has purple spikelets (or purplish brown),
otherwise it too is difficult to distinguish from var. wiegandii.