Endemic. New Zealand: North Island (Volcanic Plateau southwards), South Island (Marlborough and North Canterbury (scarce)).
Tall, slender, red tussock with crowded, erect, stiff, rush-like leaves. Leaf-sheath to 300 mm, dark brown, keeled, incurving, fracturing into short segments, internerves glabrous or long hairy, margin scabrid, separating and coiling, apical tuft of hairs to 3 mm. Ligule to 1 mm. Leaf-blade to 1 m long and 1.2 mm diameter, falling with part of sheath, red to red-brown, acicular rush-like, splitting longitudinally, keel hollow, undersides glabrous but infrequently with long hairs near base, prickle-teeth towards apex, upper surface with rows of short hairs at base, and prickle-teeth; margin scabrid, with long hairs below, and prickle-teeth above. Culm to 1.5 m, internodes glabrous, sheath glabrous. Inflorescence to 45 cm, open on pulvinate branches, glabrou except for long hairs at branch axils and short stiff hairs below spikelets, rarely becoming scabrid above. Spikelets of up to 9 florets. Glumes glabrous, acute, infrequently awned, less than or equal to adjacent lemma lobes, lower to 12 mm, 1-3-5-nerved, upper to 14 mm, 3-5-7-nerved. Lemma to 5 mm; hairs dense on margin, usually absent or sparse elsewhere, < sinus; lateral lobes to 6 mm including awn to 3 mm, rarely unawned; central awn to 13 mm from twisting column to 3 mm. Palea to 8 mm. Callus to 1.5 mm, hairs to 4 mm. Rachilla to 0.75 mm. Lodicules to 1 mm. Anthers to 3.5 mm. Ovary to 1 mm; stigma-styles to 4 mm. Seeds to 3.5 mm.
Chionochloa rubra is a New Zealand native also known as red tussock grass. It is a leafy evergreen grass-like perennial which brings a graceful spreading form of thin, coppery leaves to the landscape. It forms soft, open graceful mounds that move in the slightest breeze. It is mostly admired for the colour of the leaves, which range from a metallic golden tan to a dramatic coppery red. In winter the leaves tend to be beige at their tips, with coppery tones at their bases. It has been award the RHS Award of Garden Merit.
