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Alkali Muhly To Be Released this Year

Alkali muhly (Muhlenbergia asperifolia) grass

Alkali muhly (Muhlenbergia asperifolia) will be released this year by the NRCS Los Lunas, New Mexico, Plant Materials Center

 Sometimes called scratchgrass, Alkali muhly (Muhlenbergia asperifolia) will be released this year by the NRCS Los Lunas, New Mexico, Plant Materials Center to commercial producers and to others for field office evaluation plantings. Typical habitats for this species are damp meadows, moist riparian zones, and mesic (moderately moist) disturbed areas often with alkaline and saline soils. Alkali muhly is a perennial

NRCS Los Lunas, New Mexico, Plant Materials Center

Established 1937, the NRCS Los Lunas Plant Materials Center has provided the semiarid and arid Southwest region with plant solutions for over 60 years. The Center has released over 30 improved conservation plants including varieties of cane bluestem, blue grama, desert willow, bottlebrush squirreltail, and Rocky Mountain and narrowleaf penstemon. The Center also has developed new vegetative methods for improving rangeland, native landscaping, streambank stabilization, wildlife habitat enhancement, native shrub transplanting and mine reclamation

grass with elongated scaly rhizomes (undergrown stems that spread from the original plant and initiate new plants) and an open, finely-branched seed head up to 18 inches tall. The seed used to develop this selected release was collected in a damp arroyo bottom near the Westwater Spring in San Juan County, New Mexico. Selection for agronomic production potential has resulted from several successive field plantings at the NRCS Los Lunas Plant Material Center. The application of this species for riparian restoration on mesic sites with moderate salinity or alkalinity is a certainty. The center will be investigating the potential range of use of this species on more xeric and saline soils. The rhizomatous nature of this species as well

White Sands, New Mexico desert scene

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as its tendency to thrive on shorelines of ditches and streams will make it very useful in bank stabilization.   Because of its rapid spread, it could be planted as seedling stock at low density to rapidly colonize stream and ditch banks susceptible to erosion.
Your contact is Gregory Fenchel, Director, NRCS Los Lunas Plant Materials Center, at 505-865-4684, or gregory.fenchel@nm.usda.gov.