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Green bristlegrass

Setaria viridis

Also called Green bristol-grass, Green Bristle Grass, Green Foxtail, Bristlegrass, Foxtail, Green Foxtail Millet, Wild Foxtail Millet, Green Fox Tail Grass

Green bristlegrass
Photo: Rasbak, CC BY-SA 3.0

Green bristlegrass (Setaria viridis) is a hardy annual grass native to Eurasia that colonises waste ground, lawns and field margins. It is grown mainly as a weed or as the wild ancestor of foxtail millet, not as an ornamental.

Family
Poaceae (Grass family)
Grows as
Grass, Annual
Light
Full sun
Water
Needs little water; it tolerates dry spells once established.
Soil
Tolerates poor, disturbed and sandy or loamy soils.
Temperature
Hardy in temperate climates; frost kills the plant at the end of its annual cycle.
How easy
Easy
Native range
Old World to C. & SE. Australia
Climate
temperate

About

Setaria viridis is a species of grass known by many common names, including green foxtail, green bristlegrass, and wild foxtail millet. It is sometimes considered a subspecies of Setaria italica. It is native to Eurasia, but it is known on most continents as an introduced species and is closely related to Setaria faberi, a noxious weed. It is a hardy grass which grows in many types of urban, cultivated, and disturbed habitat, including vacant lots, sidewalks, railroads, lawns, and at the margins of fields. It is the wild antecedent of the crop foxtail millet.

This is an annual grass with decumbent or erect stems growing up to a meter long, and known to reach two meters or more at times. The leaf blades are up to 40 centimeters long and 2.5 wide and glabrous.

Other Setaria plants

Japanese bristlegrass · Foxtail millet · Palmgrass · Yellow foxtail · African bristlegrass · Hooked bristlegrass · Bristlegrass

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Setaria viridis 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.

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