59 



BUCHLOE. 



Buchloe dactyloides (Bufl'alo Grass). 



This grass is extensively spread over all the region known as the 

 Great Plains. It is very low, the bulk of leaves seldom rising more than 

 3 or 4 inches above the ground, growing in extensive tufts, or patches, 

 and spreading largely by means of stolons or off-shoots similar to those 

 of the Bermuda grass, these stolons being sometimes 2 feet long, and 

 with joints every 3 or 4 inches, frequently rooting and sending up 

 flowering culms from the joints. The leaves of the radical tufts are 3 

 to 5 inches long, one or one-half line wide, smooth or edged with a few 

 scattering hairs. The flowering culms are chiefly dioecious, but some- 

 times both male and female flowers are found on the same plant, but 

 in separate parts. Next to the grama grass it is, perhaps, the most 

 valuable plant in the support of the cattle of the plains. (Plate G6.) 



TRIODIA. 



Spikelets several to many-flowered in a strict spike-like or an open, spreading pan- 

 icle, some of the upper flowers male or imperfect; outer glnuies keeled, acute or 

 ucutish, awnless; flowering glumes imbricated, rounded on the back, at least below, 

 hairy or smooth, three-nerved, either mucronate, three-toothed, or three-lobed at the 

 apex, or obscurely erose, often hardened, and nerveless in fruit ; palet broad, promi- 

 nently two-keeled. 

 Triodia seslerioides (Tall Redtop). 



This grass grows from 3 to 5 feet high. The culms are very smooth; the leaves 

 are long and flat, the lower sheaths hairy or suioothish. 



The panicle is large and loose, at first erect, but finally spreading widely. The 

 branches are single or in twos or threes below, and frequently 6 inches long, divided 

 and flower-bearing above the middle. The spikelets are on short pedicels, 3 to 4 

 lines long and five or six-flowered. The outer glumes are'shorter than the flowers, 

 unequal and pointed; the flowering glumes are hairy towards the base, having 

 three strong nerves, which are extended into short teeth at the summit. It is a large 

 and showy grass when fully matured, the panicles being large, spreading, and of a 

 purplish color. 



It grows in sandy fields, and on dry, sterile banks, from New York 

 to South Carolina and westward. It is eaten by cattle when young, 

 but the mature culms are rather harsh and wiry and not relished by 

 them. It is, however, cut for hay where it naturally abounds. 



The genus Triodia has its chief distribution in Texas and the adja- 

 cent region, where there are several species which seem to have some 

 importance in the grass supply of these arid districts. Among these 

 are Triodia trinerviglumis. Triodia stricta, Triodia Texana, and Triodia 

 acuminata. 



These deserve further investigation. (Plate 67.) 



ARUNDO. 



Tall grasses with an ample panicle, spikelets two to many-flowered, the flowers 

 rather distant, silky-hairy at the base, and with a conspicuous silky-bearded rhachis, 

 all perfect ; outer glumes narrow, unequal, glabrous, lanceolate, keeled, acute; How- , 

 ering glumes membranaceous, slender, awl-pointed; palets much shorter than the 

 glumes, two-keeled, pubescent on the keels. 



