Rydberg : Rocky Mountain flora 605 



erally known as P. nemoralis is quite different from the European 

 plant. The latter is found in America as sparingly introduced 

 in the Eastern States. The European plant is taller, with soft, 

 flaccid leaves, ovate or lanceolate acute ligules, larger spike- 

 lets and narrowly lanceolate empty glumes which are tapering 

 gradually at the apex and much narrower than the flowering 

 glumes. The American plant is usually lower and stiffer, has 

 rather firm leaves, truncate ligules, smaller spikelets, broader 

 empty glumes, which are rather abruptly acuminate and at least 

 the second almost as broad as the flowering glumes. The name 

 P. nemoralis was used for the American plant by Hooker and 

 Arnott,* but appears there without a description. It was adopted 

 by several authors on western botany ; but, as far as I know, 

 never described under that name, until 1899 by Professor Scribner. 

 His description and plate illustrates the American rather than the 

 European plant. As the type may be designated : 



Wyoming : Headwaters of Clear Creek and Crazy Woman 

 River, 1900, Frank Tweedy J 706. 



Poa phoenicea Rydb. sp. nov. 



Perennial with a horizontal rootstock and extravaginal innova- 

 tions ; culm 5-6 dm. high, leafy; sheaths loose, 5-15 cm. long, 

 striate ; ligules triangular-lanceolate or ovate, acute, about 5 mm. 

 long ; blades 1—2 dm. long, about 2 mm. wide, rather firm, 

 strongly veined ; panicle 6—10 cm. long, open, its branches 

 mostly in pairs, the lower 5—6 cm. long; spikelets 4— 5-flowered, 

 6-7 mm. long ; empty glumes lanceolate, acuminate, purple or 

 green below and purple above, glabrous and shining ; flowering 

 glumes lanceolate, green at the base, purple in the middle and 

 brownish-scarious at the top ; both nerves and internerves villous ; 

 cobweb none ; intermediate nerves very faint. 



This species resembles somewhat P. psetido-pratensis, P. epilis 

 and P. pnrpnraseens Vasey (see below). From the first it differs 

 by the more acuminate glumes, the faint intermediate nerves of the 

 flowering glumes and the longer, narrower leaves ; from the other 

 two by the open inflorescence, the villous, not scabrous flowering 

 glumes and the creeping rootstock. 



Colorado : Pike's Peak Valley, Aug. 21, 1901, F. E. & E. S. 

 Clements j.66. 



* Hot. Beech. Voy. 132. 1832. 



