Achnatherum paradoxum

Achnatherum paradoxum is a tufted perennial grass in the Poaceae family, native to montane and steppe regions of southern Europe, particularly the Iberian Peninsula and parts of the Mediterranean basin and adjacent western Asia, where it grows on rocky slopes, calcareous outcrops and open dry pastures. The plant forms dense bunches of slender, wiry culms 30 to 80 centimetres tall arising from a fibrous root system without creeping rhizomes. The leaves are predominantly basal, narrow, involute (inrolled), 1 to 3 millimetres wide and somewhat rigid, with a short, membranous ligule and rough margins. The inflorescence is an open to narrow, slender panicle 10 to 25 centimetres long bearing few-branched clusters of spikelets. Each spikelet contains a single floret; the lemma is firm, narrow and tipped with a long, conspicuously bent and twisted awn 3 to 6 centimetres long that is geniculate near its midpoint and twisted in the lower portion, aiding seed dispersal and self-burial in soil.