GLUMACE^ 399 



The habitat is tufted, the plants forming large 

 tussocks. The stem is stout. The roots are strong 

 and fibrous, with thick stolons spreading horizontally, 

 which serve as sand-binders. The leaves are broadest 

 at the base, stiff, erect, jointed to their sheaths, not 

 so long as the spikes. 



The panicle is one-sided, erect, three-angled. The 

 flower consists of four to nine spikelets, with the 

 rachis, which is wavy or flexuous, produced beyond 

 the spikelets. The outer glumes are somewhat 

 downy. The spikelets are somewhat spreading, 

 flattened, stalkless, in two rows. There is a single 

 flower in each spikelet. There are two narrow 

 unequal glumes, the upper five-nerved, longer than 

 the flowering glumes, the lower not so large. There 

 are no lodicules. The stamens are three in number. 

 The ovary is glabrous. The style and stigma are 

 long, the latter hairy. The fruit is enclosed in the 

 palea and flowering glume. 



The plant is i to 4 ft. high. It is in flower in 

 August, and is a herbaceous perennial. 



The flowers are wind-pollinated and the stigmas 

 ripen first. 



The caryopsis may be detached and blown away to 

 a distance by the wind. 



This species serves the same purpose on muddy 

 coasts that Marram does on sand dunes in helping 

 to bind the sand together, and is thus of economic 

 importance. 



Spartina Townsendi. — In Fig. 112 the one-sided 



