Alopecurus arundinaceus, Alopecurus ventricosus,
Reed Foxtail, Creeping Foxtail, Creeping Meadow Foxtail,
Hebrew: זנב-שועל ביצתי, Arabic: الثعلبية القصبية

Scientific name:  Alopecurus arundinaceus Poir.
Synonym name:  Alopecurus ventricosus Pers.
Common name:  Reed Foxtail, Creeping Foxtail, Creeping Meadow Foxtail
Hebrew name:  זנב-שועל ביצתי
Arabic name:  الثعلبية القصبية
Family:   Graminea (Poaceae), Grass Family, משפחת הדגניים

Flowers of Israel: Alopecurus arundinaceus,Alopecurus ventricosus, Reed Foxtail, Creeping Foxtail, Creeping Meadow Foxtail, זנב-שועל ביצתי

Life form:   Hemicryptophyte
Stems:  culms 30-110 cm high, erect, not rooting from the nodes
Leaves:  Alternate, entire
Flowers:  Panicle 2-9 cm long, 8-13 mm wide, broadly cylindrical. Spikelets 4-6 mm long; glumes acute, slightly to markedly divergent at the tips, connate for a quarter their length, wingless, the keel and nerves covered with silky hairs up to 2 mm long; lemma usually longer than the glumes, sometimes ± equalling them, slightly to markedly obliquely truncate, the margins connate for a third their length; awn exceeding the tip of the lemma by up to 5 mm, but ,often included in the glumes; anthers 2-3.5 mm long
Fruits:  Fruit - caryopsis, Caryopsis ellipsoid, longitudinally grooved, hilum long-linear
Flowering Period:  March, April
Habitat:  Humid ground, riverbanks
Distribution:  Mediterranean Woodlands and Shrublands, Semi-steppe shrublands, Montane vegetation of Mt. Hermon
Chorotype, טיפוס התפוצה:  Euro-Siberian - Med - Irano-Turanian
Summer shedding:  Perennating

Flowers of Israel: Alopecurus arundinaceus,Alopecurus ventricosus, Reed Foxtail, Creeping Foxtail, Creeping Meadow Foxtail, זנב-שועל ביצתי


Derivation of the botanical name:
Alopecurus, Greek αλωπεκουροϛ, alopecuros a fox's tail.
arundinaceus, Arundo, read, cane; things made from reeds or shaped like a reed; resembling a reed.
The Hebrew word: זנב-שועל, zanav-shual , a tranlation from the scientific name Alopecuros, a fox's tail.
  • The standard author abbreviation Poir. is used to indicate Jean Louis Marie Poiret (1755 – 1834), a French clergyman, botanist and explorer.
  • The standard author abbreviation Pers. is used to indicate Christiaan Hendrik Persoon (1761 – 1836), a mycologist, born in South Africa, who donated his herbarium to the House of Orange, in return for an adequate pension for life.

Flora of Israel online