The open plant encyclopedia
Snap a photo or search by any name to see how to care for it, where it comes from, whether it's safe, and a 3D model you can turn.
The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.
Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.
Briza maxima
Also called Greater Quaking Grass, Big Quaking Grass, Large Quaking Grass, Giant Quaking Grass, Blowfly Grass, Great Quaking Grass, Quaking Grass
Big quakinggrass is a small annual grass with drooping, heart-shaped seed heads that rattle in the wind. It is grown for its ornamental and dried flower heads, and is easiest to grow from seed sown in cool weather.
Briza maxima is a species of the grass genus Briza. It is native to Northern Africa, Western Asia and Southern Europe and is cultivated or naturalised in the British Isles, the Azores, Australasia, the western United States, Central and South America, and Hawaii.
This species has a large number of common names, including big quaking grass, great quaking grass, greater quaking-grass, large quaking grass, blowfly grass, rattlesnake grass, greater rattlesnake grass, shelly grass, rattle grass, and shell grass.
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Briza maxima by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
