Mediterranean false brome
Brachypodium retusum
Family · Poaceae · Harmless
The low rhizomatous grass that forms continuous carpets in the limestone Mediterranean scrub of eastern and southern Spain, among thymes and rosemaries. It is the grass one treads for kilometres on those trails without noticing.
Scrubland · Uplands · Roadsides and waste ground · Walls and rocks
Also known aschalk false brome
How to tell it
Twenty to fifty centimetres, with rhizomes forming dense patches of greyish green. The leaves are short, stiff and often cut straight across at the tip, as if trimmed, which is what the scientific name says. The spikelets are long and cylindrical, almost stalkless, set against a zigzag axis.
What it is confused with
No dangerous lookalikes known in the Iberian Peninsula.
What it is for
Poor pasture and fine fuel: it is one of the grasses that most helps fire run through Mediterranean scrub. No food use.
Where it occurs
Each square is an area with recorded observations of this plant. The lighter background is the set of areas where any of the entries has been observed, and serves as a reference. Note what this is not: it is not where the plant lives, it is where people record it, so trails and towns always look fuller than the mountains. Data from GBIF.