DESCRIPTIONS OF SOME COMMON WEEDS 151 



ed annual, with erect or spreading, flattened stems, six to 

 twenty-four inches high ; sheaths compressed and some- 

 what hairy ; leaf blade long and narrow, both surfaces be- 

 ing smooth, as a rule, although the upper side is occa- 

 sionally rough and thinly hairy; spikes five to seven, 

 widely spreading, arranged at the apex of the stem in the 

 manner of the fingers of the hand (digitately), often with 

 one or two branchlets below the apex, two to four inches 

 long, greenish ; spikelets three to six-flowered ; glumes 

 pointless ; terminal flower a mere rudiment ; seeds in- 

 closed within a thin, loose pericarp ; blooms from June to 

 October. Found on both waste and cultivated ground, 

 and although an introduced grass, has been naturalized 

 in the South and in the East. 



Southern Spear Grass (Eragrostis pilosa, (L.) Beauv.). 

 An annual, growing five to eighteen inches tall, with 

 erect or ascending stem, diffusely branched near the base ; 

 sheaths somewhat bearded at the throat, otherwise 

 smooth ; leaves narrow, flat and smooth, but folding back 

 on the midrib when dry; panicle elongated, three to 

 twelve inches long, widely spreading primary branches 

 very loose, solitary, or two or three together; spikelets 

 narrow, lanceolate, at length becoming linear, three to 

 fifteen-flowered, mostly much shorter than their hairy 

 pedicels, although sometimes exceeding them in length ; 

 glumes all ovate and acute, flowering ones three-nerved ; 

 grain long; blooms from June to October. A common 

 roadside weed in all parts of the Mississippi valley, oc- 

 curring most frequently in sandy, sterile ground, but 

 found also on railroad embankments and especially abun- 

 dant in flood plains of streams. 



Candy Grass (Eragrostis me gastachya, (Koeler) Link). 

 A rather showy, much-branched annual with erect, or 

 ascending stems, six inches to three feet high ; sheaths 

 smooth but hairy at the throat; ligules (projections from 

 the upper part of the sheath) mere fringes of short hairs; 



