HOLCUS, Linn: 



SPIKELETS in rather dense, oblong or interrupted panicles, laterally compressed, 

 disarticulating from the tips of the pedicels ; rhachilla slightly produced beyond 

 the upper floret, disarticulating more or less readily below the valves ; joints 

 slender, lower curved and often appendaged. Florets 2, lower perfect, upper 

 usually male, sometimes perfect or barren. 



GLUMES 2, membranous, keeled, acute or acuminate, lower 1-nerved, upper 

 3-nerved, sometimes awned. Valves shorter than the glumes, chartaceous, very 

 obscurely 5-3-nerved, lower awnless, upper awned. Pales narrow, 2-keeled. 

 Lodicules 2, delicate. Stamens 3. Ovary glabrous ; styles distinct ; stigmas 

 plumose, laterally exserted. Grain laterally compressed, enclosed by the valve 

 and pale and often adhering to the latter, soft ; hilum short ; embryo small. 



ANNUAL OR PERENNIAL. Blades flat or convolute when dry ; panicle usually 

 more or less contracted, sometimes almost spike-like ; spikelets deciduous, pallid. 



Species about 6 ; 2 common in Europe, but naturalised in many temperate 

 countries ; I in South Africa, the rest Mediterranean. 



PLATE 481. 



HOLCUS LANATUS, Linn. (Fl. Cap., Vol. VII., p. 465). 

 Nat. Order Gramineae. 



PERENNIAL, tufted, 2-3 feet high. CULMS 3 to 4-noded, softly hairy, at least 

 below the panicle, rarely quite glabrous ; leaf-sheaths reversedly and softly hairy, 

 rarely glabrous, villous at the nodes, the uppermost inflated ; ligule membranous, 

 oblong, pubescent, 1 line long ; blades linear to linear-lanceolate, up to 6 inches, 

 by 2 to 3 lines, the uppermost very short, flat, softly hairy. 



PANICLE erect, oblong, 2 to 6 inches long, usually contracted ; rhachis, 

 branches, branchlets and pedicels hairy. 



SPIKELETS oblong, 2j to 2J lines long, whitish or purplish. 



GLUMES almost equally long, mucronate, scabrid, keels pectinate-ciliate, the 

 lower narrower, the upper broader with prominent side-nerves ; lower floret perfect, 

 upper male ; lower valve obliquely lanceolate-oblong, rather more than one line 

 long, with a few hairs on the keel, very obscurely 5-nervtd ; callus with a few 

 long hairs ; upper valve smaller and thinner, awn shorter than the valve, at length 

 recurved, rather stout ; pales as long as their valves. Anthers | to 1 line long. 



H&bit&t : NATAL. The Dargle, 3400 feet alt., Woodhouse in Government 

 Herbarium, 9177. 



Drawn from the Dargle specimen, the only one in our Herbarium. Introduced. 



Native of Europe, Siberia and North Africa, introduced into most temperate 

 regions of both hemispheres. 



" A well known perennial pasture grass of considerable fattening property. 

 For rich soil better grasses can be chosen, but for moist, moory or sandy lands, and 

 also for forests, it is one of the most eligible pasture-grasses, yielding an abundant 

 and early crop ; it is, however, rather disliked by cattle and horses. Bears 

 continued grazing off extremely well " Baron F. v. Mueller. 



Fi<: 1, A spikelet ; 2, lower plume; 3, upper plume ; 4, florets ; 5, lower valve ; 6. pale ; 

 7, pistil, stamens and lodicules ; 8, upper valve. AH enlarged. 



