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Junegrass for Dry Sites Across the Country
by Stevie Daniels
In the rarefied world of turfgrass research, junegrass (Koeleria macrantha) is hot stuff. A native bunchgrass found in prairie, open woods, and sandy soil from Ontario to British Columbia, south to Delaware, Missouri, Louisiana, and California, junegrass has medium green, ribbonlike leaves and grows in tufts about 18 inches high.
One reason turfgrass scientists have become intrigued by junegrass is the performance of 'Barkoel', a cultivar introduced by Barenbrug Company, a Dutch corporation with branches in the United States, China, and Australia. "'Barkoel' makes a dense, low-growing, medium green turf," says Reed Funk, a Rutgers University breeder who spent 20 years developing the advanced-generation fescues and has become known as the "guru of grass seed." Although not native to the United States, 'Barkoel' has been included in turf trials at Rutgers University, New Jersey, since 1980. Funk says Rutgers researchers collected seed of junegrass growing in Eastern Europe and Mongolia and established it in test plots, but its performance has not been as good as that of 'Barkoel'.
Bird's foot violet (Viola pedata) is a good choice to fill in the gaps between clumps of junegrass. (Photo: James C. Grimes)
William A. Meyer, another Rutgers University breeder, also sees a rosy future for junegrass as turf. "Junegrass is an extremely good, low-maintenance grass," he says. "It does not want to be fertilized."
Leah Brilman, a plant geneticist with Seed Research of Oregon, regularly gathers seed from grasses in old parks, graveyards, and pastures where plants persist without human help. On one outing, she collected material that she thought was bluegrass, and later discovered was junegrass. Always on the lookout for a new, low-maintenance turfgrass, she is now busy developing junegrass cultivars appropriate for use in a lawn setting. She says it will be at least five years before any are ready for release.
However, if you're the adventurous type, you garden on dryish soils in the plant's native range, and you're looking for a low-maintenance, drought-tolerant alterative to conventional turf, why wait?
Growing Junegrass
Junegrass prefers sandy and/or thin, gravelly soil—soil that tends to be dry and not very fertile. In other words, fertilizing is not only unnecessary but can be downright detrimental. The turfgrass experts agree that when it is fertilized, junegrass becomes too dense, puts out too many tillers, and becomes susceptible to dollar spot, rust, and other diseases.
If you have a suitable site, how do you go about growing a junegrass lawn? The best time to plant is early spring, before the soil has warmed up. Junegrass is a cool-season species, and so its seeds will not germinate once the soil is warm. You can, however, try seeding in the fall.
As is the case with any native grass you decide to plant, you must prepare the seedbed properly before sowing. Remove the existing grass and weeds completely. (See detailed bed preparation instructions in "Planting a Native Grass Lawn Step by Step.") For large areas, Meyer recommends sowing 125 pounds per acre. That translates into about 4 to 5 ounces per 100 square feet for smaller plots. Meyer also recommends using a starter fertilizer (such as 10-10-10) at planting time, but never fertilizing again.
Keep in mind that bunchgrasses grow in clumps, leaving small gaps between plants—unlike creeping species, which develop naturally into an unbroken stand. You can scatter more seed of bunchgrasses to cover those bare areas, or use the opportunity to plant low-growing wildflowers. Some good associates for junegrass are violets (Viola species), prairie buttercup (Ranunculus rhomboideus), pasque flower (Anemone pulsatilla), blue-eyed grass (Sisyrinchium campestre), and prairie smoke (Geum triflorum). If you add wildflowers to your junegrass lawn, mow only once a year, no lower than 4 inches.
You can mow junegrass every three or four weeks to keep it low, but if you leave it unmowed you will get to enjoy the glossy, silvery green, spikelike seed heads that the plants send up in early summer. Cut no lower than 3 inches. Or, if you are ready for a more natural look, cut the grass only once a year in early spring, before the bird and mammal nesting season. If you have a very large yard, you might want to mow narrow footpaths and along the boundaries with neighbors' properties. In the Rutgers trials, the junegrass has been mowed regularly, so Meyer could not give advice about its performance as an unmowed, low-growing grass. The same is true of Brilman's research.
After seeding junegrass, water lightly to keep the soil slightly moist. When junegrass becomes established, it only needs to be watered once a month in the summer.
Junegrass Mixtures
Because junegrass is a cool-season type, it stays green longer than the warm-season natives, which begin their growth in late spring, stay green all summer, and begin to go dormant and turn beige in fall. Brilman has not tried combining junegrass with other species, but said she thought an interesting experiment would be to mix cool-season fine fescues with warm-season blue grama (Bouteloua gracilis) and buffalograss (Buchloë dactyloides) to extend the length of time that the turf looks green. Junegrass could substitute for fine fescues as the cool-season grass in such a mix.
In its natural habitat—mixed-grass prairie—junegrass associates with little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium), needlegrass (Stipa spartea), and western wheatgrass (Agropyron smithii), as well as some short and tall prairie grasses, including buffalograss and sideoats grama (Bouteloua curtipendula).
Based on this knowledge, and in an effort to come up with a way to extend the length of green color in my lawn, I planted in my front yard an experimental blend of buffalograss, blue grama, and junegrass with a few sheep fescue (Festuca ovina 'Glauca') clumps scattered throughout. In late summer, it became apparent that the junegrass had not germinated well. So, in small pots I sowed seed of junegrass that I had reserved. In late September, when the weather was beginning to cool off at night, I set the plants out. They are thriving this spring, and I am eagerly awaiting the silvery seedheads, which should appear in late May.
Unlike many of the other native grasses in this book, junegrass is a bit of an unknown. If you decide to experiment with it, you will be charting new territory. So, take notes and share what you discover.
Stevie Daniels is the director of publications for Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania. She is the the author of The Wild Lawn Handbook: Alternatives to the Traditional Front Lawn (Macmillan, 1995) and gardening columnist forPennsylvania Magazine. She has been a Penn State Master Gardener since 1988. Daniels has spent the last three years replacing the grass in her own yard with native plants and a front lawn of native grasses.