Invasive Species in North America
The grass is an introduced species in North America. Brachypodium sylvaticum is an invasive species colonizing new areas and outcompeting native plants. As this species has spread to the Pacific Northwest of the U.S. it has demonstrated a capability of dominating forest understories and open grasslands to the exclusion of all other flora found in those areas.
Recent observations suggest that populations at the leading edge of the expanding range undergo an establishment phase before they can contribute to the local invasion, perhaps because newly colonized populations are suffering from inbreeding depression.
- Oregon
Brachypodium sylvaticum is a newly invasive brome species in Oregon that is rapidly expanding in the Pacific Northwest. Although B. sylvaticum appears to be in the early phases of invasion in North America, it has become a noxious weed throughout the Willamette Valley area of Oregon in the last 20 years. It is speculated that B. sylvaticum was first introduced to Oregon in range experiments when accessions from the native range were planted at two locations in the Willamette Valley anywhere between 70 to 80 years ago.
Read more about this topic: False Brome
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—Ellie Ross, Travelling companion for Miss Americas. As quoted in Miss America, ch. 17, by Ann-Marie Bivans (1991)