It is growing in a field of ours in Southeast Georgia. It is a "bunch" grass of sorts with a fairly large bunch, about a foot or so in diameter, at the base. It has the thin purple stalks with seeds growing in an airy bunch from the clump of grass blades. It seems to be pretty invasive if left alone but is absolutely stunning with the sun shinning on the morning dew.

A picture of the grass in the field 09-28-09

A closer look at the purple grass in the field 09-28-09

These are some more wild bloomers. I believe the yellow is golden rod. I'm not sure what the purple is. I DO KNOW the Butterflies love it all. You can just see some tall grass in the pictures - I think we always used to call this broom sedge but not sure.

The Wild field 09-28-09

The purple fennel type 09-28-09

The yellow --- see the butterflies?? 09-28-09

Pic 2 The yellow --- see the butterflies?? 09-28-09

The "tumbleweed" appearance is definitely descriptive of what I am seeing as well as the habitat.

2. Panicum capillare L.
Witchgrass, Panic Capillaire

Plants annual; hirsute or hispid, hairs papillose-based, often bluish or purplish. Culms 15-130 cm, slender to stout, not woody, erect to decumbent, straight to zigzag, simple to profusely branched; nodes sparsely to densely pilose. Sheaths rounded, hirsute or hispid, hairs papillose-based; ligules membranous, ciliate, cilia 0.5-1.5 mm; blades 5-40 cm long, 3-18 mm wide, linear, spreading. Panicles 13-50 cm long, 7-24 cm wide, usually more than 1/2 as long as the plants, included at the base or exserted at maturity, disarticulating at the base of the peduncles at maturity and becoming a tumbleweed; branches spreading; pedicels 0.5-2.8 mm, scabrous, pilose. Spikelets 1.9-4 mm, ellipsoid to lanceoloid, often red-purple, glabrous. Lower florets sterile; lower glumes 1/3-1/2 as long as the spikelets, 1-3-veined; upper glumes 1.8-3.1 mm, 7-9-veined, midveins scabridulous; lower lemmas 1.9-3 mm, extending 0.4-1.1 mm beyond the upper florets, often stiff, straight, prominently veined distally; upper florets stramineous or nigrescent, sometimes with a prominent lunate scar at the base, often disarticulating before the glumes, leaving the empty glumes and lower lemmas temporarily persisting on the panicles. 2n = 18.

Panicum capillare grows in open areas, particularly in disturbed sites such as fields, pastures, roadsides, waste places, ditches, sand, rock crevices, etc. It grows throughout temperate North America, including northern Mexico. It also grows in Bermuda, the Virgin Islands, and sporadically in South America, and has become naturalized in much of Europe and Asia. It appears to hybridize with P. philadelphicum.