Eustachys paspaloides(Vahl) Lanza & Mattei

Brown Rhodes grassCaribbean fingergrass

WFO wfo-0000869372 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Eustachys paspaloides, photographed by douglaseustonbrown
fig. a douglaseustonbrown, CC BY-SA 4.0 / 2021-01-28 / obs. 114053448
Eustachys paspaloides, photographed by douglaseustonbrown
fig. b douglaseustonbrown, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 63460582
Eustachys paspaloides, photographed by Nicola van Berkel
fig. c Nicola van Berkel, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 15712894
Eustachys paspaloides, photographed by Nicola van Berkel
fig. d Nicola van Berkel, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 15709535
Eustachys paspaloides, photographed by Nicola van Berkel
fig. e Nicola van Berkel, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 15707026
Eustachys paspaloides, photographed by Nicola van Berkel
fig. f Nicola van Berkel, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 15199257
Eustachys paspaloides, photographed by Ricus Nel
fig. g Ricus Nel, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 173161820
Eustachys paspaloides, photographed by Matthew Fainman
fig. h Matthew Fainman, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 59561775

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 24 botanical countries

Regions where Eustachys paspaloides is native: Angola, Botswana, Cape Provinces, Chad, DR Congo, Eritrea, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Free State, Kenya, KwaZulu-Natal, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Northern Provinces, Rwanda, Somalia, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Oman, Yemen AngolaBotswanaCape ProvincesChadDR CongoEritreaEswatiniEthiopiaFree StateKenyaKwaZulu-NatalLesothoMalawiMozambiqueNamibiaNorthern ProvincesRwandaSomaliaTanzaniaUgandaZambiaZimbabweOmanYemen
Native distribution of Eustachys paspaloides, 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.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Angola ANG AFRICA
Botswana BOT
Cape Provinces CPP
Chad CHA
DR Congo ZAI
Eritrea ERI
Eswatini SWZ
Ethiopia ETH
Free State OFS
Kenya KEN
KwaZulu-Natal NAT
Lesotho LES
Malawi MLW
Mozambique MOZ
Namibia NAM
Northern Provinces TVL
Rwanda RWA
Somalia SOM
Tanzania TAN
Uganda UGA
Zambia ZAM
Zimbabwe ZIM
Oman OMA ASIA-TEMPERATE
Yemen YEM

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 95 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 1.3 °C 6.9 °C 12.6 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 23.4 °C 27.1 °C 30.2 °C
Annual rainfall 390 mm 592 mm 863 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 16 mm 74 mm 133 mm

It is found where winters are cool but frost is light or absent. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 95 research-grade observations of Eustachys paspaloides 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 10 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.

  • Anatherum muticum P.Beauv.
  • Andropogon capensis Houtt.
  • Andropogon muticus L.
  • Chloris capensis Thell.
  • Chloris equitans Trin.
  • Chloris paspaloides Hochst.
  • Cynosurus paspaloides Vahl
  • Eustachys capensis Chiov.
  • Eustachys mutica Cufod.
  • Eustachys paspaloides subsp. paspaloides

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. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. 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.