 Hello. My name is Greg Endress. I work as an extension agronomist at the Carrington Research Extension Center. At the center we have a living weed exhibit and so within the exhibit we have grassy weeds in one line and I like to talk about some identification features of a half a dozen of our common grassy weeds. Before I get to the weeds I have a barley plant that I'm holding because I want to talk about some of the basic characteristics on grassy weed identification. So with barley it has what's known as oracles. There are little extensions of the base of the leaf that go around the stem and so that's one thing to look for in the collar area of grasses. Also the wild oats has a membranous ligule. It's sometimes called a rain catcher and it's a little extension that's at the base of the leaf. In addition we'll look at other things such as hairiness or lack of hairs on the leaves or on the stem and we also look at the the roundness or flatness of the stem and that can give us some clues on identifying our grassy weeds. With the grassy weeds I'll start with wild oats. Wild oats is an annual weed. It emerges early in the season because it likes the cool weather and also likes very good soil moisture. In comparing the wild oats to the barley they both will have a membranous ligule. However, wild oats will lack the oracles that we saw with the barley. Most of the time there will be some sparse hairs on the edge of the leaf closest to the base of the leaf closest to where it's attached to the stem. So if you see long hairs on the edge of the leaf at the base that would be a clue as well. Otherwise that's it for hairs on wild oats. Another secondary feature is looking at the way that the leaves twist. Oftentimes they'll have a counterclockwise twist and that can be a secondary way to confirm that it is wild oats and not some of the other grassy weeds that we'll talk about. Next I'd like to talk about the pigeon grass or with more detail they're actually referred to as foxtail. We have two species of foxtail yellow and green. There's a couple of similar characteristics between the two. They both lack oracles and they both have hairy ligules instead of the the wild old to the barley which have the membranous ligule. But there are some characteristics that we can use to distinguish the two foxtails. And so we'll start with yellow foxtail. Yellow foxtail will have very long hairs at the base of the leaf where it's connected to the stem. So that's one difference because green foxtail will lack long hairs on the the leaves as well as the stem. Sometimes are some very sparse short hairs in the collar area but typically they're not visible. And then another characteristic with yellow foxtail is that it has a flattened stem as compared to green foxtail that has a rounded stem. So those two features the long hairs at the base of the leaf on yellow foxtail and having a flattened stem would be the two best ways to distinguish yellow from green foxtail. The next pair of grass weeds I like to talk about are winter annuals and they are donny brome and Japanese brome. Both of these weeds are very difficult to control in our our cereal crops in particular in winter wheat because winter wheat has the same biology as as these two weeds because they they also are winter annuals. So when we look at ways to distinguish the two especially from other other grassy weeds then it's pretty easy. With both of these they lack oracles and they have membranous ligules and we can actually differ between the two based on the ligules but in the field it's probably not very practical. But as a point of information the the donny brome will have a little bit longer or more jagged ligule as compared to the Japanese brome. But in the field there's two very easy ways to distinguish the two of them and number one is based on the the type of hair that's present on the on the leaves and on the stems. With donny brome it'll have very short dense hairs in particular on the leaves and sometimes it's referred to as having a crew cut appearance. And so it is different compared to Japanese brome which typically will have more denser hairs and you can actually see that on these plants on the stems as well as on the leaves. So that the hairs are more dense and actually longer as compared to donny brome. And then at this point of the season the plants are heading because they are winter annuals and then when we see the the seed production you can clearly see differences between the the two brome grass species. With the donny brome it has much more of an open panicle and so very easy to distinguish as compared to the Japanese brome that has what we call more of a closed panicle. In fact the individual seed heads will have a bit of a cigar shape to them a rounded tubular shape. So again when they get to this point it's easy to identify but the plants will be very difficult to control at this stage. The last grass weed that I like to talk about is barnyard grass. Sometimes it's referred to as water grass because it likes wetter conditions compared to some of our other grasses that we've talked about. On identifying barnyard grass is lacking things that some of the other grasses earlier discussed have. So with barnyard grass it lacks the oracles, it also lacks the ligule and it lacks hairs. What it does have is a flattened stem so this could be confused with yellow fox tail. However it does not have the long hairs like yellow fox tail at the base of the leaves. Sometimes and actually oftentimes we'll have a reddish color at the base especially as it gains a little more growth but don't use that as your primary characteristic because some of the other grasses will have a reddish color as well especially if they're stressed. In addition with barnyard grass as it gains some growth it will have oftentimes a prostrate growth to it or quite flattened and that is another secondary cue that it's not fox tail or wild oats or other grassy weeds.