Woolly honeygrass

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Woolly honeygrass
Woolly honeygrass (Holcus lanatus)

Woolly honeygrass ( Holcus lanatus )

Systematics
Commelinids
Order : Sweet grass (Poales)
Family : Sweet grasses (Poaceae)
Subfamily : Pooideae
Genre : Honey grasses ( holcus )
Type : Woolly honeygrass
Scientific name
Holcus lanatus
L.

The woolly honeygrass ( Holcus lanatus ) is a species of plant that belongs to the sweet grass family (Poaceae). It is widespread in Eurasia and North Africa.

Regional trivial names are Bottermeddel, Honigmeddel, Honigschmale, Pein, Sametschmale, Witten Meddel or Zuckerschmale.

description

illustration

The woolly honeydew grass is a hibernating green, perennial herbaceous plant that reaches heights of between 20 and 100 centimeters. All above-ground parts of the plant are densely hairy. It grows loosely to densely grooved with upright stalks or stalks rising from a curved base . The lower part of the stem base is veined reddish-purple on a whitish background. The stalks are thin and have two to three downy, hairy nodes .

The alternate distributed around the stalk leaves are divided into leaf sheath and blade. The leaf sheaths on the back are rounded, glabrous or not very hairy, then with hairs turned back. The ligule are membranous, roughly fringed, blunt and about 1 to 5 millimeters long. The flat leaf blade is pointed at a length of 4 to 20 centimeters and a width of up to 10 millimeters. The leaves are very dense, short-haired and therefore look gray-green or whitish green.

The flowering period is between May and August. The white to purple, open only during flowering panicles are narrow-oval or egg-shaped, very tight to loose and up to 10 centimeters long. The panicle branches are hairy, densely branched. The elongated to elliptical, 4 to 6 millimeters long spikelets fall closed when ripe. The spikelets are two-flowered, the lower flower is hermaphroditic, the upper usually male. The paper-like glumes are as long as the spikelet and are hairy on the keels and nerves. The lower one is narrow-lanceolate and single-nerved; the upper ovoid to elliptical, three-veined and usually with an awn about 1 millimeter long . The lemmas are between 2 and 2.5 millimeters long and are completely enclosed by the glumes. They are keeled upwards, indistinctly three to five nerved, firm and shiny. The lower one is boat-shaped, blunt and not awned; the upper one is branded on the back near the tip. This awn becomes up to 2 millimeters long and when dry it curves like a fish hook, but does not protrude from the spikelet. There are Karyopsen formed.

The number of chromosomes is 2n = 14.

Possible confusion

The overall sparsely hairy soft honeygrass ( Holcus mollis ) is very similar . This grass has long, tough rhizomes and the stalks are bearded and hairy. The awns on the upper lemmas are only slightly curved and protrude from the glumes. The stem base is reddish-brownish veined on a brownish background. In contrast to the woolly honeygrass, it grows preferentially on the edges of the forest and in open forest areas.

ecology

In general, the common grass is agriculturally considered a pasture weed . In the pasture and in the hay it is spurned by the cattle because it is very hairy. On poorer soils, however, young plants have a certain yield value .

The woolly honeygrass is a partially evergreen, frost-sensitive hemicryptophyte and a clump plant. It is a humus root with VA mycorrhiza .

The flowers are self-sterile . In terms of flower ecology, it is wind flowering of the "hanging flowering type".

The diaspores (unit of spread) are the spikelets that fall off as a whole at maturity; they spread out as wind spreaders, balloon pilots, swimmers, rain sprouts and watery people. The awn of the upper lemma, up to 2 mm long, is curved like a fish hook when dry and thus allows it to spread out as a Velcro hook. It also spreads randomly through grazing animals. The caryopses are light germs . The fruit ripens from July to November.

Occurrence

The woolly honeygrass is widespread throughout Europe , West Asia, North Africa and Macaronesia . It is now a neophyte in North America and other areas of the world with temperate climates . It is also common in Germany everywhere and widespread from the lowlands to at altitudes of around 900 meters. In the Allgäu Alps, it rises in the Tyrolean part between Jungholz and Sorgschrofen up to 1150 meters above sea level.

It is comparatively undemanding and grows on almost all dry to wet soils from heavy loams to sand . Its main area of ​​distribution is in wet meadows and pastures on moist, humus-rich, moderately nutrient-rich, slightly acidic loam and clay soils. At lower altitudes it occurs mainly in marsh marigold meadows (Calthion). At higher altitudes, it is also in oat grass - companies (Molinio-Arrhenatheretea) to find. Sometimes it also grows in dwarf shrub heaths and grasslands , dry and semi-arid grasslands, and in deciduous and coniferous forests on acidic, nutrient-poor soils. The kind is class character of the European economic meadows and economic pastures, Molinio-Arrhenatheretea.

photos

  • Flower panicle still contracted

  • Flower panicle at flowering time

  • Ligule

  • Stalk and leaf base

swell

  • Erich Oberdorfer : Plant-sociological excursion flora . With the collaboration of Theo Müller. 7th, revised and expanded edition. Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart (Hohenheim) 1994, ISBN 3-8252-1828-7 .
  • Henning Haeupler, Thomas Muer: picture atlas of the fern and flowering plants of Germany . Ed .: Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (=  The fern and flowering plants of Germany . Volume 2 ). Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart (Hohenheim) 2000, ISBN 3-8001-3364-4 .
  • CE Hubbard: Grasses - Description, Distribution, Uses. Ulmer Verlag, Stuttgart, 1985. ISBN 3-8001-2537-4 .
  • E. Klapp & WO v. Boberfeld: Pocket book of grasses. Recognition, determination, location and socialization, evaluation and use. Paul Parey Publishing House, Berlin, Hamburg, 1990. ISBN 3-489-72710-X

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Woolly honeygrass. In: FloraWeb.de.
  2. ↑ a b Erich Oberdorfer : Plant-sociological excursion flora for Germany and neighboring areas . 8th edition. Verlag Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-8001-3131-5 . Page 243.
  3. ↑ a b c Ruprecht Düll , Herfried Kutzelnigg : Pocket dictionary of plants in Germany and neighboring countries. The most common Central European species in portrait . 7th, corrected and enlarged edition. Quelle & Meyer, Wiebelsheim 2011, ISBN 978-3-494-01424-1 .
  4. ↑ a b c Dietmar Aichele, Heinz-Werner Schwegler: Our grasses. Sweet grasses, sour grasses, rushes. , Franckh-Kosmos Verlag, 12th edition, 2011, ISBN 978-3-440-12573-1
  5. ↑ Erhard Dörr, Wolfgang Lippert : Flora of the Allgäu and its surroundings. Volume 1, IHW, Eching 2001, ISBN 3-930167-50-6 , p. 164.

Web links

Commons : Wolliges Honeydew  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files