Bulbous foxtail

Alopecurus bulbosus Gouan (Poaceae), bulbous foxtail, is a slender, tufted perennial grass of coastal and brackish marshes, damp meadows and seasonally flooded grasslands in western and southern Europe, North Africa and parts of southwestern Asia, with scattered naturalised occurrences elsewhere. Plants reach 20-60 cm tall, distinguished by the swollen, bulbous bases of the lowermost culm internodes which give the species its epithet and function as perennation organs over dry summers. Leaves are narrowly linear, flat or weakly inrolled, 5-15 cm long and 1-3 mm wide, with smooth or scabrid sheaths. The inflorescence is a dense, cylindrical, spike-like panicle 2-7 cm long and 4-6 mm wide, pale green to purplish, composed of one-flowered laterally compressed spikelets. Each lemma bears a fine geniculate awn that projects beyond the glumes. The species is salt-tolerant and characteristic of coastal grazing marshes on heavy clay soils.