''Briza media'' is a
perennial
A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives more than two years. The term ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the years") is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also widel ...
grass in the family
Poaceae
Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns an ...
and is a species of the
genus
Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...
''
Briza''.
Common name includes quaking-grass, common quaking grass, cow-quake, didder, dithering-grass, dodder-grass, doddering dillies, doddle-grass, earthquakes, jiggle-joggles, jockey-grass, lady's-hair, maidenhair-grass, pearl grass, quakers, quakers-and-shakers, shaking-grass, tottergrass, wag-wantons
Description
Grows to 40cm and flowers June to September in the UK. Characterised by fine stems and
hops
Hops are the flowers (also called seed cones or strobiles) of the hop plant '' Humulus lupulus'', a member of the Cannabaceae family of flowering plants. They are used primarily as a bittering, flavouring, and stability agent in beer, to w ...
-shaped green and purple spikelets. Distinguished from the closely related
Briza maxima by the size of the flower spikelets.
Distribution and habitat
This grass species is common in England and Wales It grows in dry calcareous grassland.
NaureSpot - Quaking Grass
/ref> Its seeds are consumed by many farmland birds.
Briza media - keskmine värihein.jpg, Keila, Estonia
PNBT Briza media wiecha 03.07.10 pl.jpg, Bory Tucholskie National Park, Poland
References
*
Pooideae
Grasses of Europe
Plants described in 1753
Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus
{{Pooideae-stub