09-June June’s Grass Secrets

Summary

From towering fescues that brush the sky to rogue barley spikes that hitchhike on coats, June transforms London into a grass lover’s paradise. Discover couch grass’s guerrilla tactics, wild barleys with "migrating" seeds, and the delicate wood melick that thrives where other plants fail. Return on 09 June to explore these unsung botanical marvels—where every blade tells a story.

Article

Grasses

In June the pollen count increases as more and more grasses come into flower, particularly towards the end of the month when grasses seem to be suddenly in flower everywhere. Three more common fescues can now be found, two of which are so tall they always seem to get noticed. The Giant fescue Festuca gigantea can reach one and a half metres in height and the Tall fescue F. arundinacea even taller at 2 metres. Giant fescue is usually found in shady spots in damp woods where its long delicate drooping flowerheads stand out. Tall fescue is usually seen has large coarse tussocks of grass at the sides of roads. It has virtually no hair-like awns compared with the long ones of Giant fescue. One other fescue likely to be seen is the Meadow fescue F. pratensis which is like a smaller version of the Tall fescue except with narrower leaves and is found in meadows. Fescues are difficult to identify accurately in field not least because they often hybridise. In the case of Meadow fescue it will even hybridise with rye grasses.

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

The most disliked grass in London has to be Couch grass Agropyron repens due to it being such a persistent weed and almost impossible to eradicate from gardens. Because of its notoriety, unlike most grasses it has been given other names such as Twitch, Squitch and Quich. Couch grasses are often confused with rye grasses (Lolium spp.) but can usually be told apart by their more widely spaced flowers or spikelets. In Couch grass as much as one third of their stems are made up of short, flattened pointed spikelets with no awns arranged alternately in two rows. It is ubiquitous in London but not so two other couch grasses. The Bearded couch A. caninus is occasionally seen in chalky areas. It has long awns helping to identify it and the Sea couch A. pungens, which is more likely to be seen along the banks of the Thames is slightly blue in colour.

Field crops of barley are easy to recognise due to their long “beards” or awns and bent stems as compared to the more rigidly upright fields of wheat and rye. Wild barleys (Hordeum spp.) are very like miniature versions of the barleys we see growing as crops. The most common in London is Wall barley Hordeum murinum which can be found everywhere on waste ground. It has the typical densely compressed flattened flowerhead or spike of barleys with two rows of spikelets all with long projecting awns.

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

Another similar-looking barley but found in damp meadows is the Meadow barley H. secalinum. When mature the spikes of barley tend to be brittle and easily fall of getting attached to clothes. If a piece is placed inside the cuff of a coat sleeve, in quite a short space of time it can migrate unaided up to the shoulder of the coat. Their stiff awns allow this to happen which explains why cattle do not eat barley as it can cause blockages in their guts.

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

In shady woods Wood melick Melica uniflora is getting noticed more as it comes into flower along the sides of paths. Its tuft of leaves remains green all year but now its spreading flowerheads made up of branches of different lengths and small numbers of awnless spikelets catch our attention. It has an attractive delicate look so much so gardeners plant it in deep shade where little else will grow. Another type of grass with only a single member present in London is a Crested hair grass Koeleria macrantha. It looks a little like a foxtail or cat’s tail grass except much more silvery in appearance. With its narrow, downy sea-green leaves it may be found in chalky districts. Another individual grass worth looking for in June is the Fern grass Catapodium rigidum.

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

For once it is a small grass (15 cms) easy to identify with its stiff stems and rigid flattened flowerheads which are very reminiscent in shape of a young fern frond. It can be found on bare sand or near walls especially in East London and can be grey-green, purplish or even reddish in colour.

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

The only wheat we tend to see in London are the fields of wheat occasionally grown around its periphery. This is likely to be Bread wheat Triticum aestivum which has solid-looking upright hollow stems with broad grains on four-sided flowerheads. Wheat is believed to be the first grass ever cultivated by man. It was probably a Middle Eastern species which was selected again and again for larger and larger grains. The result is that there are now thousands of different cultivars of bread wheat some even with different colours of grains. We tend to just notice it occasionally where seed has possibly been spilt beside roads or in gardens where it is sometimes grown for flower arranging.

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

Two attractive places to look for grasses this month are Totteridge fields where up to ten different species can be found and a hay meadow in Yeading Brook fields which boasts seventeen species. For the enthusiast a walk on Walthamstow marshes is the best place having forty-five different species, hybrids, varieties and casuals.

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image

09-June June’s Grass Secrets Section Image