Little barley

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Hordeum pusillum

Little barley, a reference photo
Photo: Matt Lavin from Bozeman, Montana, USA · CC BY-SA 2.0 (licence)

Hordeum pusillum, also known as little barley, is an annual grass native to most of the United States and southwestern Canada. It arrived via multiple long-distance dispersals of a southern South American species of Hordeum about one million years ago. Its closest relatives are therefore not the other North American taxa like meadow barley (Hordeum brachyantherum) or foxtail barley (Hordeum jubatum), but rather Hordeum species of the Pampas of central Argentina and Uruguay. It is less closely related to the Old World domesticated barley, from which it diverged about 12 million years ago. It is diploid.

From Wikipedia, under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Is it poisonous?

We have no record of Little barley being toxic, poisonous or venomous. That is not proof that it is safe. Never eat, touch or handle a wild plant, mushroom or animal on the strength of an identification; ask someone qualified.

Easily confused with

Classification

Kingdom
Plantae
Phylum
Tracheophyta
Class
Liliopsida
Order
Poales
Family
Poaceae
Genus
Hordeum
Species
Hordeum pusillum

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