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Common horsetail (Equisetum arvense), in Dutch: heermoes.

Field horsetail or common horsetail is a nonflowering plant, multiplying through spores. The common name "common horsetail" references the appearance of the plant that when bunched together appears similar to a horse's tail. Some other common names include "horse pipes", "bottle-brush", "snake-grass", "devil's-guts", "horsetail fern", "pine-grass", "meadow-pine", and "foxtail-rush".

The plant grows in a wide range of conditions, in temperatures less than 5 °C (41 °F) to greater than 20 °C (68 °F) and in areas that receive annual rainfall as low as 100 mm (3.9 in) and as great as 2,000 mm (79 in). It commonly occurs in damp and open woodlands, pastures, arable lands, roadsides, disturbed areas, and near the edge of streams. It prefers neutral or slightly basic clay loams that are sandy or silty, especially where the water table is high, though it can occur occasionally on slightly acid soils. It absorbs silicon (10) from the soil, which is rare among herbs. It has changed little from its ancestors of the Carboniferous period.

It has separate sterile non-reproductive and fertile spore-bearing stems which are produced in early spring and are non-photosynthetic, while the green sterile stems start to grow after the fertile stems have wilted and persist through the summer until the first autumn frosts. The rhizomes can pierce through the soil up to 6 feet (1.8 m) in depth. This allows this species to tolerate many conditions and is hard to get rid of even with the help of herbicides.

The plant is difficult to control due to its extensive rhizomes and deeply buried tubers. Fire, mowing, or slashing is ineffective at removing the plant as new stems quickly grow from the rhizomes. Some herbicides remove aerial growth but regrowth quickly occurs albeit with a reduction in frond density.

The plant is widespread in the northern hemisphere, growing as far as 83° North in North America and 71° North in Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia and as far south as Texas, India and Iran. It is less widespread in the southern hemisphere, but it occurs in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Madagascar, Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand.

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Common horsetail (Equisetum arvense) Equisetum arvense focus stacked image focus stacking NL: heermoes plant spore bearing stem

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02-Jan-2026 20:32:34

24-Feb-2026 17:30:48

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