38 POACEAE 
—Sum.-fall.—Plants rarely id and mature fruits only in S Fla. Grown 
for forage and for soil improveme 
3. ZEA L. A tall annual grass, with broad, conspicuously dp 
blades, monoecious inflorescences, staminate flowers in spike-like racemes, thes 
numerous, forming large spreading panicles (tassels) terminating the Pann 
Pistillate inflorescence in the axils of the leaves, the spikelets in 8 to 16 or 
even as many as 30 rows on a thiekened, almost woody axis eob), the whole 
enclosed in numerous large foliaceous bracts (husks), the long styles (silk) 
protruding from the tops as a silky mass of threads. Spikelets unisexual; 
staminate spikelets 2-flowered, in La on one side of a continuous rachis, 
one nearly sessile, the other pedicellate: glumes membranaceous, acute: lemma 
and palea hyaline: pistillate ane sessile, in pairs, consisting of one fertile 
floret and one sterile floret, the latter sometimes developed as a second fertile 
floret: glumes broad, rounded or emarginate at apex: style very long and 
1. Z. Mays L. Stem up to . tall, stout, 
leafy: leaf. blades ie oer elongate, 
fuly 10 em. e, nate 
wi or less: st 
oe erect, 20-30 em. long, with ene 
or drooping branches: pistillate paniele 
ultimately n from the leaf-sheaths, 
the grains white variously color ed.— 
CORN. i OR. Maize. )—Roadsides, 
fields, ne waste-places, locally throughout 
our rT Nat. of m.—Sum.- 
fall — Extensively ie in many vari- 
eties in Am from pre ehistoric times. 
Corn is one Cof the important economie 
plants of the world. 
: X L. Diffuse monoecious annuals, with narrow elongate leaf- 
blades. Inflorescence compound, each branch bearing a bead-like involucre 
enclosing 1 pistillate and 2 sterile spikelets, and a short staminate raceme 
on a slender peduncle protruding from an orifice at the summit of the in- 
oluere. Grain bags in the hard bead- 
like involuere.—Four species, natives of 
Asia; the DS now widely distributed 
in the tropic 
1. C. Lachryma-Jobi L. Stem 0.5-1.5 
tall, much-branched: leaf- peg ‘elongate 
spik 
S-TEARS. 
Widely cult. and locally escaped, cult. 
grounds and roadsides, Coastal Plain, Da 
to Tex. Nat. of E In oa 
C. A., S. A.)—Spr. -fall.—Employed mei oaa, while the hard mature in- 
volucres are used as beads. 
