By Tom Schweich
Grasses are sometimes hard to recognize, and there are lots of them. One of the easiest grasses to recognize along Golden’s trails is Needle and Thread – Hesperostipa comata (Trin. & Rupr.) Barkworth. Needle and thread grass has very long awns that wave in the breeze and catch the sun. The name “needle and thread” comes from a sharp point resembling the needle at the end of the floret and a long awn resembling the thread. However, the awn is not as flexible as real sewing thread and there is no evidence that the awn was ever actually used as thread.
Regardless, “Needle and Thread” — Hesperostipa comata (Trin. & Rupr.) Barkworth ‐ is a very attractive and common native grass in Golden and indeed throughout the northern and western United States and Canadian provinces. For example, the author has also collected it at Mono Lake, California, near Yosemite National Park, and it is found across the Great Basin, throughout Colorado, and east to about central Nebraska and Kansas.
Needle-and-thread grass is a valuable perennial bunchgrass, meaning it grows in clumps and lives for multiple years, particularly known for its drought tolerance and ability to prevent wind erosion. The long, twisted awns are hygroscopic, meaning they bend and twist with changes in humidity. This movement helps the seed bury itself in the soil, increasing the chances of germination. The awns can sometimes be problematic for grazing animals. The sharp points of the florets can also stick to clothing and animal fur, aiding in seed dispersal. Needle and thread grass is common in native plant landscaping and is not considered weedy or invasive.
Credit goes to André Michaux (1803) for first recognizing needle and thread grass, noting that the grass lives “… in the rocky mountains from the Hudson to Canada.” Unfortunately, Michaux applied a name (Stipa juncea) that Linnaeus used for a grass in Switzerland and France. Our friends, Fredrick Pursh and Thomas Nuttall, did the same. It was Carl Bernhard Trinius and Franz Josef Ruprect (1842), working at the Imperial Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg, Russia, who recognized needle and thread grass as its own species (Stipa comata). Then Mary Barkworth (1993), arguing that the “Stipa” of North American were distinct from the Eurasian Stipa, placed our grass in a new genus: Hesperostipa, derived from hesperis meaning “western” and stipa referring to the feather grasses.
Andre Michaux
André Michaux was not mentioned in previous articles, though he appears repeatedly in the history of American botany. He was appointed by the French king, Louis XVI, as Royal botanist and sent to the United States in 1785 to make the first organized investigation of plants that could be of value to France. In 1787, Michaux established a botanical garden of 111 acres in Charleston, South Carolina. Making many expeditions to various parts of North America, Michaux described and named many North American species during this time. He also sent many plants and seeds to France and introduced plants to America from various parts of the world, including Camellia, tea-olive, and crepe myrtle.
When the French royalty lost their heads in the French Revolution (1789-1794±), Michaux lost his source of income. With the support of Thomas Jefferson, he almost achieved a scientific expedition to western North America, a full decade before Lewis & Clark, but the proposal fell through. On his return to France in 1796 Michaux was shipwrecked, however most of his specimens survived. Specimens of almost 2,200 species of American plants collected by Michaux are housed at the French national herbarium (MNHN) in Paris. In 1800, Michaux sailed on an expedition to Australia, then went to Madagascar to investigate the flora of that island, where he died of a tropical fever in 1802.
References
Barkworth, Mary E. 1993. North American Stipeae (Gramineae): Taxonomic Changes and Other Comments. Phytologia. 74(1):1-25. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/13068912#page/18/
Michaux, Andre. 1803. Flora boreali-americana : sistens caracteres plantarum quas in America septentrionali collegit et detexit Andreas Michaux. [Flora of North America: consisting of the characters of plants collected and discovered in North America by Andre Michaux.] in 2 volumes. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/7567#page/75/
Trinius, Carl Bernhard, and Franz Josef Ruprecht. 1842. Species Graminum Stipaceorum. Petropoli: Typis Academiae Imperialis Scientiarum [Species of Stipa-like Grasses. Saint Petersburg: Printed by the Imperial Academy of Science] https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/15458949#page/82/
Note: When I am studying the history of plants and their discovery, such as the references above, I typically use the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL). A global consortium of over 660 contributors, BHL makes more than 63 million pages of biodiversity knowledge freely accessible online. The Smithsonian Institution, America’s museum, played a vital role in building and operating the administrative and technical components of BHL. However, as directed by the Department of Government Efficiency, on January 1, 2026, the Smithsonian will no longer host BHL. This is just one small example of how our country is stepping back from supporting global sciences. Fortunately for BHL, there are other institutions across the globe who will probably step into the void left behind this most unfortunate action of the current regime in Washington, D.C.
