1915] WiNTEK Grasses at Chapel Hill 161 



common here, but may be seen in the Episcopal Church yard 

 where it forms the deep green densely tufted cover on the 

 south side by the rock wall, where shaded by cedar and elms. 



Carex Texexsis. 



This little plant is not a grass but a sedge, and it is known 

 in ISTorth Carolina only from Chapel Hill. It is the plant 

 that forms the lawn over most of Mrs. Kluttz's yard on the 

 west side, and it makes one of the best lawns in Chapel Hill, 

 winter and summer, under the peculiar conditions there 

 existing. The soil is unusually impervious and is much too 

 wet in ordinary seasons for the best development of grass. 

 The sedge finds this dampness congenial and has taken perm- 

 anent possession. It is also an abundant constitutent of the 

 deeply shaded lawn at the old Holmes Place (see Torreya 

 11 :11. 1911, for my first record of it from IST. C). 



The Clovers and Medics. 



There are two little creeping plants of this group that 

 form a very conspicuous part of the winter and spring green 

 of our lawns and waste places. They are low hop clover (Tri- 

 folium procumhens) and black medic (Medicago lupulina). 

 They look so much alike that the casual observer makes no 

 distinction between them, calling both hop clover, but the 

 medic may be distinguished by its smaller and somewhat 

 brighter yellow flower heads and, most easily, by the more 

 elongated heads of black, exposed, kidney-shaped pods. The 

 hop clover has, in fruit, nearly spherical heads, with the little 

 brownish pods inclosed in the dried up persistent flower, giv- 

 ing them the appearance of a small head of hops. These two 

 plants are winter annuals, coming in fall and dying out in 

 May or June. They form the largest part of the spring green 

 in the less shaded places of many of our lawns. White clover 

 (Trifoliuin repens) is of course common in lawns, pastures 

 and open places. It is frequently included in lawn mixtures 

 with the grasses, and in such cases makes a larger part of the 

 winter and spring green. It is a perennial, but unless well 

 watered is apt to die out badly in summer. 



Chapel Hill, N. C. 



