Types of Feather Reed Grass – Upright, Striped, or Native

Choose feather reed grass by habit: an upright sterile hybrid, a striped leaf, or Korean or native reed. We list those four.

Choose an upright sterile hybrid, a striped leaf, or Korean or native reed

Read the Latin on the tag. The upright sterile hybrid is ‘Karl Foerster’. [1] Striped leaves are ‘Avalanche’ (wide white center) or ‘Overdam’ (more green than white). Both stay more compact than Karl Foerster. [2] Korean feather reed (C. brachytricha) is warm-season, with later pink plumes. [3] Bluejoint (C. canadensis) spreads in marshes and wet prairie — not a small-garden clump. [4]

Browse by kind

Upright sterile hybrid

‘Karl Foerster’ is the sterile upright screen — narrow green foliage and early tan plumes. It does not seed around the bed.

Striped hybrid

‘Avalanche’ has a wide white stripe down the leaf. ‘Overdam’ shows more green than white. Both are more compact than Karl Foerster and share the same cool-season hybrid.

Korean feather reed

C. brachytricha is a warm-season grass with later pink plumes that loosen by early winter. It can seed. It is not the Karl Foerster clock.

Native wetland or coastal reed

C. canadensis is a spreading wetland native, not a narrow border clump. C. nutkaensis is a coastal wet native — Pacific or Nootka reed grass — for moist ground, not a dry screen.

Not feather reed grass — pampas, fountain grass, and maiden grass

• Pampas grass (Cortaderia) is a much larger tussock with big plumes. It is not this narrow sterile hybrid.
• Fountain grass (Pennisetum) makes arching bottlebrush spikes. It is a different genus and a different shape.
• Maiden grass (Miscanthus) is a warm-season arching clump with a silver midrib — not Karl Foerster's tight vertical screen.

If the tag says pampas, fountain grass, or maiden grass, it is a different genus — read the Latin before you bed it as feather reed grass.