Indiangrass - Cheyenne

Indiangrass is a warm-season perennial bunch grass native to North America. It grows 36 to 84 inches high and changes color throughout the year from blue-green during the growing season to golden tan at maturity. Indiangrass requires full sun and prefers acidic to alkaline soils. It is highly palatable to all classes of livestock and can be suitable for grazing and hay when properly managed. Heavy grazing can cause Indiangrass to decrease.  Proper stocking rates and grazing strategies, such as rotational grazing, is advised. Indiangrass provides good nesting cover for quail and turkey and provides fawn cover. It is considered a highly desirable tall grass and is commonly referred to as one of the big four prairie grasses along with little bluestem, switchgrass, and big bluestem.  Indiangrass responds well to prescribed burning during late winter. 

Cheyenne Indiangrass was released in 1945 by the Manhattan Plant Materials Center in Manhattan, Kansas with original seed collections from a native rangeland near Fort Supply, Oklahoma in 1942. Its general adaptation ranges as far west as New Mexico, as far north as upper Iowa, and as far east as the east coast from Virginia to Florida.