456 



POACEvE. 



glumes persistent, lanceolate, hyaline, 1-nerved ; floral glume 

 larger, 3-nerved, firm, entire, retuse or 3-pointed, the central nerve 

 terminating as a mncro; palea hyaline, 2-keeled, complicate. 

 Stamens 3. Styles elongated, clotlied with short hairs. Grain 

 ovate or oblong, enclosed, but not adherent. Low annual grasses, 

 with many stiff creeping stems, the leaves pointed, firm, mostly on 

 very short branches. Spikelets subsessile and almost concealed 

 by the leaves. 



Species 3 or 4, one of which belongs to Texas and Mexico, and 

 northward to Alberta-; the others further south. 



1. M. squarrosa (Nutt.) Torr. 1. c. Ctypsis squarrosa Nutt. 

 Gen. 1:49 (1818). 



Culms firm, stoloniferous, 5-30 cm. 

 high. Sheaths 2-5 mm. long; ligule a 

 mere ring; blades flat or conduplicate, 

 1-3 cm. long. Second glume and 

 floral glume 5 mm. long. 



Colorado, Ward for U. S. Dept. 

 Agricul. 516, also Cassidy. 



The genus is a perfectly isolated 

 one, showing only some slight affinity 

 with Monanthochloe, especially in hav- 

 ing the very few spikelets sessile within 

 a cluster of floral leaves. The flowers 

 are not unisexual. 

 Var. floccuosa Vasey ined. Plants 3-5 cm. high; leaf-blades 

 10-13 mm. long; second glume 3 mm. long; floral glume 4 mm. 

 long. 



Arizona, Joiick. 



103. (214a). Orcuttia Vasey, Bull. Torr. Club, 13: 219 (1886.) 

 Spikelets 5-10-flowei'ed, sessile, compressed in a simple dense 

 panicle, 1-5 cm. long, rachilla articulate above the empty glumes. 

 Empty glomes sparsely ])ubescont, green, thickish, broad, mostly 

 3-lobed, each lobe 3-nerved, 3-4 mm. long, margins scarious, un- 

 awned; floral glume a little longer, many-nerved, round on the 

 back, 5-lobed, otherwise like the empty glumes; palea as loiig as its 



Fig. 88. — Munroa squarrosa. 

 Spikelet. (Sciibner.) 



