Festuca eskia

Festuca eskia, commonly known as Pyrenean fescue, is a densely tufted perennial grass in the family Poaceae endemic to the Pyrenees of France and Spain and adjacent Cantabrian Mountains, where it is a characteristic dominant of acidic alpine and subalpine grasslands on siliceous bedrock from about 1600 to 2500 metres elevation. It forms dense low cushions or extensive turf 10 to 30 centimetres tall with stiff, inrolled, bright green to bluish-green leaves only about a millimetre wide and a few centimetres long, sharply pointed and persisting through winter. The fertile culms are erect, slender and slightly taller than the foliage, bearing a contracted oblong to pyramidal panicle 4 to 10 centimetres long of greenish to purplish spikelets, each with several florets and short awns. The species is highly resistant to grazing, trampling and snow cover and forms the so-called gispet pastures used historically for summer grazing of sheep and cattle in the high Pyrenees.