Setaria macrostachyaKunth

large-spike bristlegrass

WFO wfo-0000899364 Accepted WFO 2026-06 4 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–d · 1 observation

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 1 time, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Setaria macrostachya, photographed by Sam Kieschnick
fig. a Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0 / 2020-05-30 / obs. 77255447
Setaria macrostachya, photographed by Sam Kieschnick
fig. b Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 77255459
Setaria macrostachya, photographed by Sam Kieschnick
fig. c Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 77255482
Setaria macrostachya, photographed by Sam Kieschnick
fig. d Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 77255487

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 15 botanical countries

Regions where Setaria macrostachya is native: Argentina Northeast, Argentina Northwest, Bolivia, Brazil Northeast, Brazil Southeast, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Galápagos, Haiti, Leeward Is., Paraguay, Puerto Rico, Venezuela Argentina NortheastArgentina NorthwestBoliviaBrazil NortheastBrazil SoutheastColombiaCubaDominican RepublicEcuadorHaitiParaguayPuerto RicoVenezuela GalápagosLeeward Is.
Native distribution of Setaria macrostachya, 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
Argentina Northeast AGE SOUTHERN AMERICA
Argentina Northwest AGW
Bolivia BOL
Brazil Northeast BZE
Brazil Southeast BZL
Colombia CLM
Cuba CUB
Dominican Republic DOM
Ecuador ECU
Galápagos GAL
Haiti HAI
Leeward Is. LEE
Paraguay PAR
Puerto Rico PUE
Venezuela VEN

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.

Also published as 13 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.

  • Chaetochloa gibbosa Scribn. & Merr.
  • Chaetochloa macrostachya (Kunth) Scribn. & Merr.
  • Chamaeraphis macrostachya (Kunth) Stuck.
  • Chamaeraphis setosa var. macrostachya (Kunth) Kuntze
  • Panicum alopecuros Fisch. ex Spreng.
  • Panicum macrostachyum (Kunth) Nees
  • Panicum macrostachyum var. patens Döll
  • Pennisetum alopecuros J.Jacq.
  • Setaria caudata var. pauciflora M.E.Jones
  • Setaria gibbosa (Scribn. & Merr.) K.Schum.
  • Setaria inopinata Toolin
  • Setaria italica var. macrostachya (Kunth) Mathieu
  • Setaria polystachya Schrad.

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.