GRASS FAMILY 



561 



smoother ; panicle looser, 5 or 6 in. long, drooping at the tip, 

 shining purple ; flcwering glume notched with a very short terminal 

 awn. — Wet places ; rare. — Fl. June — August. Perennial. 



3. C. strigosa, found in 1885 by Robert Dick, the baker 

 naturalist of Thurso, in Caithness, has larger spikelets and more 

 acuminate gliivies than the following. It is a northern type. 



4. C. negUcta (Narrow Small-reed). — Stem erect, i — 3 feet high, 

 slender, polished; leaves short, stiff, with 

 short ligules ; panicle 2 — 6 in. long, narrow, 

 erect, close, pale purplish, and green ; glumes 

 acute, longer than the hairs ; flew eying glume 

 shorter, with awn inserted rather below the 

 middle. — Bogs in Cheshire and Antrim ; 

 rare. — Fl. June, July. Perennial. 



16. Gastridium (Nit-grass), of which G. 

 lendigerum (Awned Nit-grass) is the only 

 species, is an elegant, erect grass, 6 — 12 in. 

 high, with rough-edged flat leaves and a 

 tapering spike-like panicle 1 — 3 in. long, pale 

 green with silvery lustre, and is easily dis- 

 tinguished from other British grasses by the 

 peculiar glossy, swollen base of the outer 

 glumes. — Fields near the sea that are occasion- 

 ally overflowed, in the south ; rare. (Name 

 from the Greek gasiridion, a swelling.) — Fl. 

 June — October. Annual. 



17. Apera (Wind-grass). — Annual grasses 

 with panicles of small, shining, i -flowered 

 spikelets ; outer glumes 2, membranous, acute, 

 awnless, the lower the smaller; flowering 

 glume shorter, slightly 2 -fid, with a long, 

 slender, subterminal awn. (Name from the 

 Greek aperos, undivided.) 



1. A. Spica-venti (Silky Wind-grass). — One 

 of the handsomest of grasses, 2 — 3 feet high, 

 with rather narrow, flat leaves ; panicle 3 in. long, spreading, with 

 very slender branches, and little shining spikeUts hardly a line long ; 

 awn 3 or 4 times as long as the spikelet ; anthers linear. — Sandy 

 fields; rare. — Fl. June, July. Annual. 



2. A. interrupta, with a close panicle, the branches of which 

 never spread, and short, oval anthers, occurs rarely in the eastern 

 counties. — Fl. June, July. — Annual. 



18. Ammophila (Marram-grass). — Panicle spike-like; spikelets 



00 



AMMOPHILA ARUNDINACEA 



{^Sea Marravt). 



