NC Common Wetland Plants Guide

Synonym(s): Anatherum glomeratum

Description: Medium to tall perennial grass with flowering stems 1 to 2 m high; growing in dense clumps.

Leaves: Leaves up to 30 cm long, with broad overlapping sheaths. Chalky coating makes the leaves appear bluish-green.

Flowers/Fruit: Prominent, feathery inflorescence with 1 to 4 heads of densely packed spikelets, each usually 2 to 5 cm long. Flowering and fruiting late August to October.

Habit and Range: Moist seeps, bogs, pine savannas, headwater wetlands, wet roadside ditches and wet powerline clearings. (Andropogon glomeratus var. tenuispatheus (maritime bluestem) is found in brackish and fresh tidal marshes, as well as salted roadsides. Less common in low Mountains, scarce in the western Piedmont, but widespread across the Coastal Plain.

Taxonomic Note: Andropogon glomeratus var. pumilus is also called Andropogon tenuispatheus or Anatherum tenuispatheum (maritime bluestem), which has taller stems (1 m to 1.5 m) with many more flowering heads (3 to 11), with a pale green sheen during the growing season. This taxon is naturally in brackish marshes and coastal grasslands, but has invaded inland along roadsides, abandoned fields, and damp meadows. It is never found in pine savannas, seeps, or sphagnum bogs, where the main Andropogon glomeratus is found. Andropogon glomeratus var. pumilus is considered nonnative in any county of NC that does not border the estuaries or ocean.