Barren brome

Basal leaf sheaths often red coloured leaves hairy Barren brome jagged ligule heading from mid-May. 

Presence or absence of leaf/stem hairs. A few grasses have very hairy leaves, such as barren brome and Yorkshire fog. Wild oats only have hairs on the leaf margin. Most grasses are usually hairless. 

The incidence of other brome species, such as rye brome and meadow brome, is increasing and such weeds can be more difficult to control than barren brome. 

Rotations. Growing leys and various arable crops that ate planted at different times of the year usually leads to a different weed flora. There is also an opportunity to use different types or groups of herbicides. This method is useful if there are difficult weeds such as barren brome, volunteer potatoes, herbicide resistant black-grass and weed beet to control. 

The brome grasses occur in both permanent pasture (e.g. meadow brome) or as weeds of arable land (e.g. sterile or barren brome). Improved varieties of bromes (e.g. Grasslands Matua) have been introduced in the past from New Zealand but have proved unsuccessful due to lack of persistency under UK conditions. 

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