72 



Festuca ovina (Slieeps' Fescue). 



A densely tufted, perennial grass, with an abundance of rather narrow, sometimes 

 involute, short, radical leaves, and slender culms, 1 to H feet high. The panicle is 



2 to 4 inches long, narrow, the branches mostly single and alternate, erect and few- 

 flowered ; the spikelets are mostly three to five-flowered, and about 3 lines long; 

 the outer glumes are acute and narrow. The flowering glumes are lanceolate, two 

 lines long, roughish, and with a short, rough awn about half a line long. 



This species has many varieties both in this country and in Europe. 

 It is indigenous in the mountainous parts of New England, in the Rocky 

 Mountains, and in various northern localities. 



As found in cultivation it has been derived from Europe. 



Hon. J. S. Gould, of New York, says : 



It forms the great bulk of the sheep pastures of the highlands of Scotland, where it 

 is the favorite food of the sheep, and where the shepherds believe it to be more nutri- 

 tious for their flocks than any other. Gmeliu says that the Tartars choose to encamp 

 during the summer where this grass is most abundant, because they believe that it 

 affords the most wholesome food for all cattle, but especially for sheep. Nature dis- 

 tributes it among dry, sandy, and rocky soils, where scarcely any other species would 

 grow. It is without doubt the very best of the grasses growing on sandy soils. It 

 roots deeply, and forms a dense, short turf, which adapts it admirably for lawns and 

 pleasure grounds, where the soil is sandy. It is almost useless as a hay crop, as its 

 leaves and culms are too fine to give a remunerative amount of hay ; it is only as a 

 pasture grass on sandy soils that it is valuable ; and in these, when highly manured, 

 itis driven out by the more succulent species. It is often found 4,000 feet above the 

 level of the sea. Its seeds weigh about 14 pounds to the bushel. 



(Plate 82.) 



Festuca scabrella (Bunch Grass). 



The culms are usually 2 to 3 feet high, erect, and smooth ; the radical leaves are 

 numerous, about half as long as the culms, generally rigid, involute, and scabrous on 

 the margins; the blade is prone to separate when old, leaving an abundance of leaf- 

 less sheaths at the base ; the cauline leaves are about two, short and pointed, 2 to 4 

 inches long ; the sheaths scabrous, the ligule short or wanting ; the panicle is usually 



3 to 5 inches long. 



A perennial grass growing in strong clumps or bunches, and hence 

 called u bunch grass." It is a native of the Rocky Mountain region, 

 from Colorado westward to California and Oregon. 



In Montana it is called the great bunch grass and is one of the prin- 

 cipal grasses of that country. It is the prevailing species on the foot- 

 hills and mountain slopes at from 6,000 to 7,000 feet altitude. " It is 

 rather too hard a grass for sheep, but there is no grass more valued on 

 tbe * summer ranges' for cattle and horses. It makes excellent hay 

 for horses and is cut in large quantities for this purpose. It grows in 

 large tussocks, making it rather a difficult grass to mow with a ma- 

 chine." It is one of the most important grasses of eastern Oregon and 

 Washington. (Plate 83.) 



