Parapholis incurva(L.) C.E.Hubb.

curved sicklegrass

WFO wfo-0000887099 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Parapholis incurva, photographed by Christian Berg
fig. a Christian Berg, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-05-09 / obs. 198323403

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.

The specimen a real sheet, in a real collection

Herbarium
Smithsonian, US National Herbarium
Accession
US 3433635
Filed as
Parapholis incurva (L.) C.E.Hubb.
Det. by
Simon, B.
Collected
P. M. Peterson, R. J. Soreng, G. Rosenberg & T. Macfarlane 1998-10-14
Origin
AU
The sheet
View the digitised specimen (CC0 1.0)

A real pressed plant, in a real collection, under the accession number above. Not an illustration of one. The holding institution does not serve this sheet’s image to third parties, so there is no photograph here. The record is real and the link goes to it. Where we hold no openly licensed sheet for a species this section is simply absent, and where a sheet never recorded who determined it, that field stays empty rather than being filled in. Roughly half of all herbarium sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 42 botanical countries

Regions where Parapholis incurva is native: Algeria, Canary Is., Egypt, Libya, Madeira, Morocco, Tunisia, Afghanistan, Cyprus, East Aegean Is., Gulf States, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon-Syria, North Caucasus, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Sinai, Tadzhikistan, Transcaucasus, Türkiye, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Albania, Baleares, Bulgaria, Corse, France, Great Britain, Greece, Italy, Kriti, Krym, NW. Balkan Pen., Portugal, Sardegna, Sicilia, Spain, Türkiye-in-Europe AlgeriaEgyptLibyaMoroccoTunisiaAfghanistanCyprusEast Aegean Is.Gulf StatesIranIraqKuwaitLebanon-SyriaNorth CaucasusOmanPalestineSaudi ArabiaSinaiTadzhikistanTranscaucasusTürkiyeTurkmenistanUzbekistanPakistanAlbaniaBulgariaCorseFranceGreeceItalyKritiKrymNW. Balkan Pen.PortugalSiciliaSpainTürkiye-in-Europe Canary Is.MadeiraBalearesSardegna
Native distribution of Parapholis incurva, 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
Afghanistan AFG ASIA-TEMPERATE
Cyprus CYP
East Aegean Is. EAI
Gulf States GST
Iran IRN
Iraq IRQ
Kuwait KUW
Lebanon-Syria LBS
North Caucasus NCS
Oman OMA
Palestine PAL
Saudi Arabia SAU
Sinai SIN
Tadzhikistan TZK
Transcaucasus TCS
Türkiye TUR
Turkmenistan TKM
Uzbekistan UZB
Albania ALB EUROPE
Baleares BAL
Bulgaria BUL
Corse COR
France FRA
Great Britain GRB
Greece GRC
Italy ITA
Kriti KRI
Krym KRY
NW. Balkan Pen. YUG
Portugal POR
Sardegna SAR
Sicilia SIC
Spain SPA
Türkiye-in-Europe TUE
Algeria ALG AFRICA
Canary Is. CNY
Egypt EGY
Libya LBY
Madeira MDR
Morocco MOR
Tunisia TUN
Pakistan PAK ASIA-TROPICAL

Not drawn on the map: Great Britain. We hold no public-domain boundary for this region, so it is listed rather than guessed at.

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 561 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 0.1 °C 6.5 °C 11.7 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 19.3 °C 25.3 °C 31.0 °C
Annual rainfall 263 mm 609 mm 1,321 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 4 mm 63 mm 242 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 561 research-grade observations of Parapholis incurva 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 24 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.

  • Aegilops incurva L.
  • Aegilops incurvata L.
  • Agrostis incurvata Scop.
  • Avena carmeli Boiss.
  • Lepidurus incurvus (L.) Janch.
  • Lepiurus incurvatus Dumort.
  • Lepturus cylindricus var. incurvatus (L.) Hook.f.
  • Lepturus filiformis var. incurvatus (L.) Hook.f.
  • Lepturus incurvatus Trin.
  • Lepturus incurvatus f. major Hausskn.
  • Lepturus incurvatus f. minor Hausskn.
  • Lepturus incurvatus var. secundus Lojac.
  • Lepturus incurvatus var. tortus Bab.
  • Lepturus incurvus Druce
  • Lepturus incurvus subsp. incurvatus (L.) Briq.
  • Lepturus rottboellii Münter
  • Nardus articulata L.
  • Ophiuros incurvatus P.Beauv.
  • Pholiurus incurvatus (Hook.f.) Hitchc.
  • Pholiurus incurvus (L.) Schinz & Thell.
  • Pholiurus incurvus subsp. incurvatus (L.) Maire
  • Pholiurus incurvus var. strictus (Fr.) A.Camus
  • Rottboellia incurva (L.) Roem. & Schult.
  • Rottboellia incurvata L.f.

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.