83 



30. IMPERATA. 



Spikelets with, one or rarely two flowers, usually in pairs, one sessile 

 the other pedicellate, along the slender continuous rhachis of the 

 short branches of a long cylindrical spike-like panicle, densely silky, 

 with the long hairs surrounding and seated on the spikelets. 



Glumes four, all thin, hyaline, and awnless, two outer empty ones 

 usually hairy, the third empty or rarely enclosing a flower smaller and 

 without hairs, terminal flowering glume still smaller. 



Palea usually truncate and jagged at the top. 



Stamens two, or one only in species not Australian. 



Styles distinct. 



Grain small, free, enclosed in the outer glumes. 



1. Imperata amndinacea, Cyr. 



Botanical name. Imperata, in honour of Ferrante Imperata, a 

 Neapolitan botanist of the sixteenth century ; arundinacea Latin, 

 reed-like. 



Vernacular name. ' ' Blady-grass." 



Where figured. Duthie, Agricultural Gazette. 



Botanical description (B. Fl., vii, 536). A stiff, erect perennial, 1 to 

 3 feet high, glabrous except sometimes a tuft of hairs at the nodes, 

 which however is not so common in Australian as in Indian specimens. 



Leaves erect, narrow, often longer than the stem. 



Spike-like panicle very dense, 3 to 8 inches long, regularly cylindrical, silvery white, 



with the long silky hairs concealing the glumes, the dark-coloured stigmas and 



oblong linear anthers alone protruding. 

 Spikelets 1^ to near 2 lines long. 

 Outer glume five- or seven-nerved. 

 Second, three- or five-nerved. 

 Third, usually empty. 



Value as a fodder. This is a grass very easily recognised, and many 

 people look upon its presence as indicating poor land. They also look 

 upon the grass as worthless for feed, but this is by no means the case. 

 In Bengal it forms the principal pasturage, and with us, if burnt 

 over, it produces plenty of feed, although it may not be of the best 

 quality. In our colony enormous areas of coarse blady grass are 

 systematically burnt over for cattle-feed. When old it is so fibrous 

 that only a camel could digest it. 



Other uses. "The Telingas, of India, make use of it in their marriage 

 ceremonies." (Duthie.) 



The strong broad leaves were often used for thatching in Australia 

 in the early days, a use to which it is often put in India and the Malay 

 Archipelago. Mr. O'Shanesy says that it is preferred by brickmakers 

 to any other grass for a thatch to protect their bricks when wet. 



Mr. Bailey has suggested that it might be found useful for paper- 

 making. 



Lamson-Scribner recommends it for binding river-banks," the sides 

 of dams, and loose coast sands. 



