Supina bluegrass

Poa supina is a low, mat-forming perennial grass of the Poaceae family, spreading by short, leafy stolons and forming dense, prostrate turf typically only 2 to 10 centimetres tall, occasionally producing flowering culms 10 to 25 centimetres high. The bright green to yellow-green leaf blades are soft, flat, 1 to 6 centimetres long and 1.5 to 3 millimetres wide, with a characteristic boat-shaped tip and two parallel pale lines flanking the midrib on the upper surface, in keeping with the diagnostic features of the genus Poa. The ligule is a short membranous flange and the sheaths are smooth. The inflorescence is an open, pyramidal, somewhat one-sided panicle 2 to 7 centimetres long, with slender, spreading branches bearing few small ovate spikelets 3 to 4 millimetres long, each containing two to five florets that often develop a purplish tinge as they mature. Native to mountainous regions of central and southern Europe and across to the Caucasus, the species inhabits damp, trampled, shaded ground such as alpine pastures, paths and cattle resting-places.