General Plant Information (Edit)
Plant Habit: Grass/Grass-like
Sun Requirements: Full Sun
Water Preferences: In Water
Wet
Wet Mesic
Soil pH Preferences: Moderately acid (5.6 – 6.0)
Slightly acid (6.1 – 6.5)
Neutral (6.6 – 7.3)
Minimum cold hardiness: Zone 2 -45.6 °C (-50 °F) to -42.8 °C (-45°F)
Maximum recommended zone: Zone 10a
Plant Height: 3 to 6 feet
Fruit: Showy
Edible to birds
Fruiting Time: Summer
Late summer or early fall
Fall
Flower Color: Brown
Flower Time: Spring
Suitable Locations: Bog gardening
Uses: Erosion control
Water gardens
Will Naturalize
Wildlife Attractant: Birds
Resistances: Deer Resistant
Flood Resistant
Pollinators: Wind
Conservation status: Least Concern (LC)

Conservation status:
Conservation status: Least Concern
Image
Common names
  • Softstem Bulrush
  • Great Bulrush
  • Soft-Stem Bulrush
  • Soft-Stem Club-Rush
Botanical names
  • Accepted: Schoenoplectus tabernaemontani
  • Synonym: Scirpus tabernaemontani
  • Synonym: Scirpus validus

Photo Gallery
Location: Strubel Lake in southeast Pennsylvania
Date: 2015-08-07
mass along lake edge
Location: Downingtown, Pennsylvania
Date: 2020-07-08
colony along a pond
Location: Strubel Lake in southeast Pennsylvania
Date: 2015-08-07
brown nutlets in drooping clusters
Location: Rehoboth Beach, Delaware
Date: 2008-08-01
plant on pond edge
Location: Strubel Lake in southeast Pennsylvania
Date: 2015-08-07
the Bulrush in a wet meadow
Location: Cambridge University Botanic Garden
Date: June
credit: Magnus Manske
Comments:
  • Posted by ILPARW (southeast Pennsylvania - Zone 6b) on Feb 12, 2018 7:51 PM concerning plant:
    Soft-stemmed Bulrush is not only native to almost all of North America, but also is world-wide. It grows in shallow water, fresh or brackish, in ponds and lakes, along watercourses, and in bogs and marshes. It makes a good mass for good erosion control; it makes good cover for birds; and it is a food for muskrats. It bears its orange-brown many-flowered spikelets in April-May. They become the scaled nutlets in drooping clusters. It is sold by some native plant nurseries for wet native landscape situations and for conservation district projects for erosion control and plant cover around bodies of water and watercourses.

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