BOTANICAL AND ECOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTICS
SPECIES: Bromus pumpellianus | Pumpelly Brome 



GENERAL BOTANICAL CHARACTERISTICS : 
Pumpelly brome is a native, perennial graminoid [15].  Culms are 20 to
47 inches (50 to 120 cm) tall [1,15].  Leaves are 0.16 to 0.39 inches
(4-10 mm) wide [1,17] and 4 to 8 inches (10-20 cm) long [1].  There are
generally two to four culm leaves [16].  The inflorescence is a narrow
panicle 2 to 8 inches (5-20 cm) long [14,15,16].  Spikelets are seven to
eleven flowered [1,15].  The lemma is 0.39 to 0.47 inches (10-12 mm)
long [14] and is generally short-awned [1,17].  The fruit is a caryopsis
[12].  Pumpelly brome has well-developed creeping rhizomes [15,16] and
forms colonies [16].


RAUNKIAER LIFE FORM : 
   Hemicryptophyte
   Geophyte


REGENERATION PROCESSES : 
Pumpelly brome sprouts from perennating buds at the base of the culms
[16] and from rhizomes [15].  It also reproduces by seed [17].


SITE CHARACTERISTICS : 
Pumpelly brome occurs on moist to dry sites.  It is found in woods [9],
meadows, and on grassy slopes [14,15].  In interior Alaska it occurs on
warm, dry sites on steep, south-facing slopes in young mixed hardwood
and white spruce (Picea glauca) stands [33].  In Michigan it grows on
sandy shores and dunes at the northern edge of Lake Michigan [31].  In
western Montana it occurs in moist montane or subalpine meadows [20,22].
In Colorado it is found on dry rocky slopes [14].

Pumpelly brome grows on a variety of soil types.  It occurs on gravelly
sandy clay loam on arctic alluvial fan tundra in the central Brooks
Range [8].  It is found on rocky, shallow, poorly developed soil on
bluffs in the upper Yukon valley in east-central Alaska [10].  It occurs
on deep, well-drained mineral loess soils that are rich in organics and
are underlain by permafrost on pingos near Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.  Pingo
permafrost thaws more deeply in summer than that of surrounding land
[32].  Pumpelly brome grows on marine deltas and eroding sandy seashores
of Amundsen Gulf [7].  It occurs on shallow, well-drained sandy loam
soil on a wind-disturbed butte top in southeastern Montana [25] and on
sandy loam on the Palliser winter range in Banff National Park, Alberta
[26].

Pumpelly brome occurs on soils with pH 7.0 to 8.0 in north-central
Alaska.  These soils are wind-deposited from calcareous sediments [32].
It was grown successfully on silty loam soil with pH 6.2 near Palmer,
Alaska [23].

In the Rocky Mountains Pumpelly brome is abundant up to about 11,000
feet (3,353 m) elevation, depending on latitude and other conditions
[15].  In Banff National Park it occurs from 6,204 to 7,205 feet
(1,891-2,196 m).  It was found at 3,700 feet (1,128 m) in northwestern
Montana [20].  In east-central Alaska it was recorded at 2,297 feet (700
m) elevation [10], and in the Northwest Territories it was found at sea
level [7].


SUCCESSIONAL STATUS : 
Facultative Seral Species

Pumpelly brome occurs on some recently disturbed sites, and is also
present in seral and undisturbed stands.  Pumpelly brome is occasionally
found in disturbed sites and on sandy banks in the Caribou Hills, near
Eskimo Lakes, and on the Arctic coast in the McKenzie River Delta region
of the northwestern Northwest Territories [6].

In the central Brooks Range, pumpelly brome did not appear 4 or 11 years
after disturbance on tundra alluvial fans.  It was present on undisturbed
sites [8].


SEASONAL DEVELOPMENT : 
In Colorado Pumpelly brome seeds mature from August 10 to September 10
at higher elevations and somewhat earlier at lower elevations [12].

Related categories for Species: Bromus pumpellianus | Pumpelly Brome