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Eragrostis tef; photograph J. N. Macare, CC0, via GBIF CC0J. N. Macare, CC0, via GBIF

Eragrostis tef (Zuccagni) Trotter

Teff; Abyssinian love grass; T'ef; Teff grass

Poaceae · Djibouti, Eritrea +7

No habitat climate
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Eragrostis tef, photograph J. N. Macare, CC0, via GBIFEragrostis tef, photograph J. N. Macare, CC0, via GBIFEragrostis tef, photograph J. N. Macare, CC0, via GBIFEragrostis tef, photograph J. N. Macare, CC0, via GBIFEragrostis tef, photograph J. N. Macare, CC0, via GBIFEragrostis tef, photograph Rasbak, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons 18 photographs ›

Summary

Teff (Amharic: ጤፍ), Eragrostis tef, also known as Williams lovegrass and annual bunch grass, is an annual species of lovegrass native to Eritrea and Ethiopia, where it originated in the highlands of both countries. It has been cultivated for its edible seeds, also called teff, since at least 1000 BCE and possibly as long ago as 4000 BCE. It is one of Ethiopia and Eritrea’s most important staple crops. As a modern crop, it is low-yielding and susceptible to lodging; the teff shoot fly is a major pest.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Teff", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Nothing derived: no habitat climate for this species.

Climate across the habitat

No habitat climate can be derived: Only 2 distinct land cells of the climate grid hold an in-range record placed to within 10 km; three are needed for an envelope. 92 of the 94 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or to no stated accuracy and fewer than three decimals or by something other than a person's observation, and cannot place a climate cell, though they count for the map and its marker.

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeDjibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Saudi Arabia, Yemen · introduced: Denmark, Great Britain, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland, France, Italy, Krym, South European Russia, Ukraine, Egypt, Libya, Guinea, Mauritania, Senegal, Zaïre, Sudan, Angola, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Cape Provinces, Lesotho, Namibia, KwaZulu-Natal, Free State, Northern Provinces, Madagascar, Réunion, Kazakhstan, Palestine, Nansei-shoto, India, West Himalaya, Myanmar, Jawa, New South Wales, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, New Caledonia, South Carolina, Mexico Central, Brazil North, Argentina Northwest · 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 marker8.767, 39.117 · in the densest population, 73 records (78% of those in range)
Kew's description“annual” · “seasonally dry tropical” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 94 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 92 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker in the same place. 384 records outside the WCVP native range not used. No climate across the range is derived for this species. 92 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 2° block of the 94 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Eragrostis tef, photograph 1did not loadEragrostis tef, photograph 2did not loadEragrostis tef, photograph 3did not loadEragrostis tef, photograph 4did not loadEragrostis tef, photograph 5did not loadEragrostis tef, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: J. N. Macare, CC0, via GBIF (5); Rasbak, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Other Eragrostis 22 in the reference

Eragrostis albensis Eragrostis albensis Poaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Krzysztof Ziarnek, KenraizEragrostis barrelieri Eragrostis barrelieri Mediterranean lovegrass Photo: CC0, author not statedEragrostis brownii Eragrostis brownii Brown's love grass Photo: CC BY-SA, Greg TasneyEragrostis capensis Eragrostis capensis Cape Love Grass Photo: CC BY-SA, Tony RebeloEragrostis cilianensis Eragrostis cilianensis Stink-grass Photo: CC BY, Jo RobertsEragrostis curvula Eragrostis curvula African love-grass Photo: CC BY, CK2AZEragrostis echinochloidea Eragrostis echinochloidea African lovegrass Photo: CC BY, Perry GrissomEragrostis elliottii Eragrostis elliottii Elliott's love grass Photo: CC0, author not statedEragrostis hirsuta Eragrostis hirsuta Bigtop lovegrass Photo: CC0, author not statedEragrostis hypnoides Eragrostis hypnoides Teal love grass Photo: CC0, author not statedEragrostis intermedia Eragrostis intermedia Plains love grass Photo: CC BY, Zihao WangEragrostis lehmanniana Eragrostis lehmanniana Lehmann lovegrass Photo: CC BY, Perry Grissom all 23 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Cynodon abyssinicus; Eragrostis abessinica; Eragrostis abyssinica; Eragrostis abyssinica var. alba; Eragrostis abyssinica var. viriidis and 10 more. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Poaceae
Described by
(Zuccagni) Trotter
Native to
Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia +6
Wild records
94 in range · 92 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 2026-10-22
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22
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; 40 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (25 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 15 at a zoo; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate nothing to reportasked 2026-10-22only 2 distinct land cells of the climate grid hold an in-range record placed to within 10 km; three are needed for an envelope
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22IPNI and POWO linked by Kew's number for Eragrostis tef (Zuccagni) Trotter (the item's: IPNI 401618-1, POWO 1105499-2)
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22Wikipedia's article Teff, the English article of this species' Wikidata item (Q843942)
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild nothing to reportasked 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 2026-10-22
Wikimedia Commons commons answeredasked 2026-10-22
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 79 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

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