Spike redtop

Agrostis exarata, the spike redtop or spike bentgrass, is a tufted perennial grass in the Poaceae native to western and northern North America from Alaska south through the Rocky Mountains and Pacific Coast to California and east to the Great Plains, and disjunctly into eastern Asia. Plants form loose to fairly dense bunches 20 to 120 centimetres tall arising from short rhizomes or a fibrous crown, with erect to slightly geniculate culms. The flat, slightly scabrous leaf blades are 5 to 25 centimetres long and 2 to 8 millimetres wide, with smooth sheaths and a conspicuous membranous ligule 2 to 7 millimetres long. The inflorescence is a dense, narrow, often spike-like to slightly interrupted panicle 4 to 25 centimetres long with appressed branches bearing many small one-flowered spikelets; the lemmas may be awnless or bear a delicate dorsal awn. The grain is a small caryopsis. The species occupies a wide ecological range from moist meadows and streambanks to drier slopes.