Mountain melick

Melica nutans, the mountain melick or nodding melick, is a slender perennial grass of the family Poaceae growing 20 to 60 cm tall. It spreads by thin creeping rhizomes to form loose patches, the wiry culms bearing flat, soft, bright green leaves with a short ligule. The inflorescence is a narrow, one-sided raceme of relatively few, comparatively large spikelets that nod gracefully to one side on fine stalks; each spikelet is broad, shining and brownish-purple with rounded, awnless florets. It flowers in late spring and early summer. Native across Europe and temperate Asia, nodding melick grows in shaded, often calcareous or rocky woodland, scrub and montane grassland, frequently on slopes and woodland banks.