Sandberg Bluegrass (Poa secunda)

from $2.99

Botanical name: Poa secunda‍ ‍ • Bloom season: Spring ‍ • Bloom color: Fine tan seed heads ‍ • Host plant (Great Basin): Juba skipper

A fine, low bunchgrass that greens up very early, flowers, sets seed, and then goes gold and dormant for the summer before returning with fall rain. That dormancy is important for survival and is the lowest-water grass offered at Vital Bee Buds. The clumps give small insects cover through winter.


📸 Lorraine Fitzhugh Vital Bee Buds Greenhouse 4/1/2025

📸 Matt Lavin from Bozeman, Montana, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Botanical name: Poa secunda‍ ‍ • Bloom season: Spring ‍ • Bloom color: Fine tan seed heads ‍ • Host plant (Great Basin): Juba skipper

A fine, low bunchgrass that greens up very early, flowers, sets seed, and then goes gold and dormant for the summer before returning with fall rain. That dormancy is important for survival and is the lowest-water grass offered at Vital Bee Buds. The clumps give small insects cover through winter.


📸 Lorraine Fitzhugh Vital Bee Buds Greenhouse 4/1/2025

📸 Matt Lavin from Bozeman, Montana, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Size:

Plant Characteristics

Botanical Name: Poa secunda

Common Name: Sandberg Bluegrass

Native: Native

Sun: Full Sun

Water: Low

Bloom Time: Spring

Bloom Color: Fine tan seed heads (goes summer-dormant)

Mature Size: W 8"-12" x H 8"-18"

Soil: Well-drained; lean, rocky soil, tolerates drought by going dormant

Plant Type: Perennial bunchgrass

USDA Zones: 3 to 9

Spread Habit: Clumping bunchgrass; self-sows

Available As: Live plant

Native Region: Great Basin; Columbia Plateau; Sierra Nevada; Cascade Range; Southern Rocky Mountains; Northern Rockies (widespread)

Host Plant (Great Basin): Juba skipper

Host Plant (Elsewhere in North America): red-disked alpine, common branded skipper

Growing Notes

Full sun and lean, rocky, well-drained ground. Space about 10 inches apart. Do not water it through its summer dormancy, and do not assume it has died when it turns tan in July, because both mistakes can kill the plant. It works well as a matrix grass threaded between larger plants.

  • Water: Low

  • Sun: Full Sun

  • Soil: Well-drained; lean, rocky soil

  • Mature size: W 8"-12" x H 8"-18"

Maintenance

The Sandberg bluegrass needs almost no maintenance. Do not cut it back in summer while it is dormant; wait until early spring and comb out or trim the old growth before new growth starts. No fertilizer and no summer irrigation. It self-sows modestly into bare ground.