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      1. Common Name
      2. Scientific Name
      3. Common Family Name
      4. Scientific Family Name
      5. Key to Families or Genera
      6. Salinity in the Loddon Murray Region
      7. Salinity in the Central and Northern Victorian Region
      8. Salinity in the Western Region
      9. Salinity in the Wimmera Region
      10. Salinity in the Mallee Region
      11. Salinity in the Gippsland Region
      12. Salinity in the Coastal Region
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    8. Declared Water Supply Catchments

Annual Cat's-tail

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Scientific Name:Rostraria cristata
Annual Cat's-tail flower-head
Annual Cat's-tail flower-head
Photo: A J Brown

Status:
Native to the Mediterranean but widely naturalised.

Plant Description:
A small, slender, tufted annual grass to 60 cm high but often less than 15 cm. Leaves are softly hairy and flat, to 20 cm long and 8 mm wide but often much smaller. Flower-head is a contracted, oblong to ovate, panicle of 1-8 cm long with 2-6 flowered spikelets. Outer glumes or bracts of the spikelets are slightly unequal in size; the lower being 1-2.5 mm long and the upper 2-3 mm long. The lemma (inner flower bract) is 2-3 mm long with a fine and straight awn or bristle, 1-3 mm long.

Habitat:
Widespread in drier areas of Victoria but also on near-coastal sands. Often common on seasonally wet freshwater and saline swamp and lake margins.

Comments:
Superficially similar to other small annual grasses with contracted panicles, such as Avellinia (Avellinia michelii) and Annual Fog (Holcus annuum).
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