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Bromus tectorum; photograph author not stated, no rights reserved CC0author not stated, no rights reserved · observed growing wild · 2024-10-24

Bromus tectorum L.

Drooping brome; Cheatgrass; Downy brome; Downy chess

Poaceae · Denmark, Norway +60

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Bromus tectorum, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedBromus tectorum, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedBromus tectorum, photograph (c) rosaceae_roberts, some rights reserved (CC BY)Bromus tectorum, photograph (c) rosaceae_roberts, some rights reserved (CC BY)Bromus tectorum, photograph (c) rosaceae_roberts, some rights reserved (CC BY)Bromus tectorum, photograph (c) rosaceae_roberts, some rights reserved (CC BY) 84 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
-11.7°C
Record low -25.4 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
23°C
Jul and Aug at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
805mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
5–36DLI
Lowest to highest month (DLI) CHELSA
The year in your months, northern hemisphere
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec
Rain spread: 70% of the median year's rain takes 8 months, so no short rainy season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Bromus tectorum, known as downy brome, drooping brome, or cheatgrass, is a winter annual grass native to Europe, southwestern Asia, and northern Africa, but has become invasive in many other areas. It now is present in most of Europe, southern Russia, Japan, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Iceland, Greenland, North America, and western Central Asia. In the eastern US, B. tectorum is common along roadsides and as a crop weed, but usually does not dominate an ecosystem. It has become a dominant species in the Intermountain West and parts of Canada, and displays especially invasive behavior in the sagebrush steppe ecosystems, where it has been listed as noxious weed. B. tectorum often enters the site in an area that has been disturbed, and then quickly expands into the surrounding area through its rapid growth and prolific seed production.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Bromus tectorum", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads no short rainy season: 70% of the median year's rain (564 mm of 780 mm) takes 8 months, May to December. Mean temperature moves 17.4 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: November to June.

Rain

780 mm in the median year at the habitat, 564 mm of it May to December. Wettest month October at 77 mm, driest month February at 49 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 554 mm to 1,150 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 805 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 780 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, northern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.

Light

Open sky over the habitat: 5 to 36 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 3, the highest 90th-percentile month 45).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is -11.7 °C, the absolute minimum -25.4 °C, 3,693 frost nights in 44 years, 83.9 a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 28.7 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low -1.4 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range -6.9 °C to 1.6 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 23.2 °C in July (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: -11.7 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 58 to 67% across the year (monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

How this section is made

Each card states this species' habitat figures with their sources, and what two fixed rules read from them; nothing here says what the plant does, wants or tolerates. The rules · the terms.

Seasons. Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the grid cells of the range: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve moves 4 °C or more and the habitat lies 10° or more from the equator. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain. CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the grid cells of the range. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light. CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Temperature. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, lapse-corrected -9 m to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. The cold floor is the 1st-percentile night named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity. CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the grid cells of the range.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Bromus tectorum through the yearWarmest months July and August, mean daily high 23 °C; coldest month January, mean nightly low -1.4 °C; 780 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA; the extremes at the edge from NASA POWER. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°frost28.7° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER-25.4° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125150mm rainDLI 5–36RH 58–67%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 1021 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low extremes over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, from NASA POWER, marked at the edge, in no month DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C4 / -1–85 / 0–99 / 4–1313 / 9–1618 / 14–2021 / 17–2523 / 20–2823 / 20–2719 / 15–2314 / 10–188 / 4–125 / 0–9
Night °C-1 / -7–2-1 / -7–21 / -4–44 / 1–69 / 6–1012 / 10–1414 / 12–1714 / 12–1611 / 8–137 / 4–103 / -2–50 / -6–3
Rain mm62 / 36–9449 / 32–7654 / 33–8251 / 34–9966 / 45–11270 / 47–9469 / 33–9068 / 40–9369 / 48–11577 / 39–13373 / 45–12072 / 43–113
DLI7 / 4–1312 / 8–1920 / 16–2829 / 26–3535 / 32–4036 / 33–4436 / 32–4531 / 27–3922 / 18–3014 / 10–208 / 4–145 / 3–11
RH %67 / 59–7064 / 58–6862 / 57–6459 / 57–6159 / 55–6159 / 55–6158 / 53–6158 / 54–6261 / 57–6364 / 60–6666 / 60–6967 / 60–71
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 1021 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (1081 records in those cells; 11 more cells hold records but no land by the elevation layer, so those records sit at sea and the cells are left out), with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. A dash is a month one or more of those cells has no figure for in the grid (a variable CHELSA does not carry there), so no median is taken rather than one over fewer cells. Extremes and elevation were read at a typical spot in the range, cell 733:3828 (53.325, 11.425). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -25.4 °C, 1st-percentile night -11.7 °C, 99th-percentile day 28.7 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Across the range: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 1021 distinct grid cells holding 1081 of the 1092 in-range records (11 further cells with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 733:3828 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 53.50_11.250, lapse-corrected -9 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 27 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across the cells of the in-range records placed well enough to read one, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeDenmark, Norway, Sweden, Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Hungary, Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, Corse, France, Portugal, Sardegna, Spain, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Kriti, Romania, Sicilia, Turkey-in-Europe, Yugoslavia, Krym, Central European Russia, East European Russia, South European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Ukraine, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Kazakhstan, Kirgizistan, Turkmenistan, Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Afghanistan, Cyprus, East Aegean Is., Iran, Iraq, Lebanon-Syria, Palestine, Sinai, Turkey, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, China South-Central, Inner Mongolia, China North-Central, Qinghai, Tibet, Xinjiang, Mongolia, East Himalaya, Nepal, Pakistan, West Himalaya · introduced: Finland, Great Britain, Ireland, Belarus, Baltic States, North European Russia, Canary Is., Cape Provinces, Northern Provinces, Primorye, Japan, Korea, New South Wales, Victoria, New Zealand North, New Zealand South, Hawaii, Aleutian Is., Alaska, Greenland, Northwest Territories, Yukon, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Québec, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., Vermont, West Virginia, Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, District of Columbia, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest, Argentina Northeast, Argentina South, Chile South · regions are the level-3 units of the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions, as Kew's World Checklist records ranges, some under historical names such as Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia (how).
Map marker45.114, 4.685 · in the densest population, 659 records (51% of those in range)
Kew's description“annual” · “temperate” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 1287 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 1081 of them in the land cells it reads, of 1092 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 774 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 132 km away. 440 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 195 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or with no stated accuracy (admitted only as a person's observation to three decimals), and stay on the map but off the climate.
How this section is made
The map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 4° block of the 1287 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Bromus tectorum, photograph 1did not loadBromus tectorum, photograph 2did not loadBromus tectorum, photograph 3did not loadBromus tectorum, photograph 4did not loadBromus tectorum, photograph 5did not loadBromus tectorum, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: author not stated, no rights reserved · CC0 (2); (c) rosaceae_roberts, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4).

Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.

Melampyrum arvense Melampyrum arvense Field cow-wheat Photo: CC BY, Antoine ThivolleVerbascum densiflorum Verbascum densiflorum Dense-flowered mullein Photo: CC BY, DDutreyAlisma gramineum Alisma gramineum Ribbon-leaved water-plantain Photo: CC BY, Andre HosperChenopodiastrum hybridum Chenopodiastrum hybridum Maple-leaved goosefoot Photo: CC BY, Zoltán NagyLathyrus tuberosus Lathyrus tuberosus Tuberous pea Photo: CC BY, Анна МитрошенковаPotentilla recta Potentilla recta Sulphur cinquefoil Photo: CC0, author not stated

Other Bromus 30 in the reference

Bromus arenarius Bromus arenarius Australian brome Photo: CC BY, swainsona1Bromus arvensis Bromus arvensis Field brome Photo: CC BY, Наталья ПикаловаBromus benekenii Bromus benekenii Lesser Hairy-brome Photo: CC BY, Vladimír FukaBromus briziformis Bromus briziformis Rattlesnake brome Photo: CC0, author not statedBromus bromoideus Bromus bromoideus Poaceae Photo: Public domain, DaderotBromus carinatus Bromus carinatus California brome Photo: CC BY, Milan ChytrýBromus catharticus Bromus catharticus Rescue grass Photo: CC0, author not statedBromus ciliatus Bromus ciliatus Fringed brome Photo: CC BY, kursicBromus commutatus Bromus commutatus Meadow brome Photo: CC BY, Наталья ПикаловаBromus diandrus Bromus diandrus Great brome Photo: CC BY, zebedeugalinhaBromus erectus Bromus erectus Upright brome Photo: CC BY, Vladimír FukaBromus grossus Bromus grossus Whiskered brome Photo: CC BY-SA, Gerhard Nitter all 31 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Anisantha pontica; Anisantha tectorum; Anisantha tectorum subsp. tectorum; Anisantha tectorum var. hirsuta; Bromus abortiflorus and 53 more. (GBIF Backbone)

Under another author Bromus sterilis Láng and Bromus sterilis Láng ex Kumm. & Sendtn. is an older name of this species, not Bromus sterilis, a species of the reference. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Poaceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Denmark, Norway, Sweden +59
Wild records
1287 in range · 774 open

Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →

Where this page came from built 2026-10-21
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-21
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-21
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-21names fetched 2026-10-21
WCVP native range wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04
GBIF occurrence records gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 26 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (18 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 2 at a herbarium, 6 at a zoo; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-21
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-21NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 53.50_11.250, lapse-corrected -9 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-21
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild answeredasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-21
OpenAlex papers openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshot

Every source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 273 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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