Coleataenia anceps(Michx.) Soreng

beaked panicgrass

WFO wfo-0000922906 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Coleataenia anceps, photographed by Eric Knight
fig. a Eric Knight, CC BY 4.0 / 2020-11-18 / obs. 104881693
Coleataenia anceps, photographed by Dan Johnson
fig. b Dan Johnson, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 101244227
Coleataenia anceps, photographed by Dan Johnson
fig. c Dan Johnson, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 100727434
Coleataenia anceps, photographed by Cleveland Powell
fig. d Cleveland Powell, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 96311981
Coleataenia anceps, photographed by John Abrams
fig. e John Abrams, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 95581153
Coleataenia anceps, photographed by Tom Field
fig. f Tom Field, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 95410881
Coleataenia anceps, photographed by Judy Gallagher
fig. g Judy Gallagher, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 92370785
Coleataenia anceps, photographed by Michael Ellis
fig. h Michael Ellis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 102213300

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 26 botanical countries

Regions where Coleataenia anceps is native: Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia AlabamaArkansasFloridaGeorgiaIllinoisIndianaIowaKansasKentuckyLouisianaMarylandMississippiMissouriNew JerseyNew YorkNorth CarolinaOhioOklahomaPennsylvaniaSouth CarolinaTennesseeTexasVirginiaWest Virginia DelawareDistrict of Columbia
Native distribution of Coleataenia anceps, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Alabama ALA NORTHERN AMERICA
Arkansas ARK
Delaware DEL
District of Columbia WDC
Florida FLA
Georgia GEO
Illinois ILL
Indiana INI
Iowa IOW
Kansas KAN
Kentucky KTY
Louisiana LOU
Maryland MRY
Mississippi MSI
Missouri MSO
New Jersey NWJ
New York NWY
North Carolina NCA
Ohio OHI
Oklahoma OKL
Pennsylvania PEN
South Carolina SCA
Tennessee TEN
Texas TEX
Virginia VRG
West Virginia WVA

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Where it actually grows measured, from 1,034 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -3.8 °C -0.1 °C 8.4 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 28.9 °C 31.3 °C 34.8 °C
Annual rainfall 960 mm 1,233 mm 1,515 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 162 mm 249 mm 311 mm

It is found where winters bring light frost. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 1,034 research-grade observations of Coleataenia anceps that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.

Also published as 14 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Agrostis nutans Poir.
  • Coleataenia anceps subsp. rhizomata (Hitchc. & Chase) Soreng
  • Panicum anceps Michx.
  • Panicum anceps subsp. rhizomatum (Hitchc. & Chase) Freckmann & Lelong
  • Panicum anceps var. angusta Vasey
  • Panicum anceps var. densiflorum Vasey
  • Panicum anceps var. rhizomatum (Hitchc. & Chase) Fernald
  • Panicum nutans (Poir.) Desv.
  • Panicum pensylvanicum Spreng.
  • Panicum rhizomatum Hitchc. & Chase
  • Panicum rostratum Muhl. ex Willd.
  • Sorengia anceps (Michx.) Zuloaga & Morrone
  • Sorengia anceps subsp. rhizomata (Hitchc. & Chase) Zuloaga & Morrone
  • Vilfa nutans (Poir.) P.Beauv.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. USDA PLANTS Database. common name, checklist symbol PAAN. public domain. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.