94 



Spikes or dusters all on rather long, slender, glabrous, or ciliate peduncles, within the 



last bract. 

 Barren spikelets either reduced to a single several-nerved rigid glume, with a small 



hyaline one inside, or more developed, enclosing a male flower, the four involucral 



ones sessile. 



Fertile spikelets about 4 lines long. 



Rigid outer glumes, especially the lowest, densely villous with brown hairs. 

 Awn long and rigid as in the two preceding species. 



Value as a fodder. Undoubtedly a valuable grass,, chiefly for the 

 dry country and dry tablelands. . It is of a tussocky habit, and pro- 

 duces a large quantity of palatable and nutritious food. 



Few men could have been better acquainted with this grass than 

 O'Shanesy, but his account, which follows, is not very favourable ; he 

 probably refers to the old growths : 



" It is perennial, and grows in large tufts, but its foliage is very 

 harsh, and, therefore, rejected by cattle as well as by the kangaroo." 



Habitat and range. Found in all the colonies except Tasmania. 

 In New South Wales it prefers good soil and occurs from the table- 

 land to the interior. 



4. Anthistiria membranacea, Lindl. 



Botanical name. Membranacea, Latin, like parchment, in allusion 

 to the translucency of the glumes. 



Vernacular names. " Landsborough Grass," "Barcoo Grass" (both 

 named after Queensland localities), " Bed Gulf Grass" (in allusion 

 to its growth in the Gulf of Carpentaria country). 



Where figured. Bailey. Agricultural Gazette. 



Botanical description (B. FL, vii, 543). Quite glabrous, sometimes 

 forming dense leafy tufts of 6 inches, the branching stems often 

 elongated to 1 or 2 feet. 



Leaves flat, appearing almost articulate on the short, flat, prominently striate sheaths. 

 Floral leaves or bracts with coriaceous sheaths and short lanceolate laminse. 

 Panicles small, dense, almost cyme-like, as in Aplnda, with very numerous small 



spikes or clusters, each subtended by a scarcely longer bract. 

 Spikelets scarcely 2 lines long, glabrous, the four involucral ones pedicellate, the 



fertile one rather longer than the two pedicellate barren ones beside it. 

 Glumes all thin, the outer one acute with several green nerves, the second with one 



or three nerves. 

 Awn very fine, scarcely more than as long again as the spikelet. 



Value as a fodder. This is mainly a Queensland grass, and Bailey 

 says of it : 



" When under cultivation, it makes a dense intricate growth from 1J 

 feet to over 2 feet in depth, and being very leafy and full of seed 

 should make good, nutritious hay. It is the rule to cut grass for hay 

 when in flower, but with a grass like this, this rule cannot be strictly 

 adhered to, for, from an early period of its life, it continues to flower 

 and mature seed. When closely fed, it bears good seed on stems only 

 2 or 3 inches high, and, although a tropical grass, has been found to 

 thrive admirably in the Brisbane district. . . . Probably no grass, 

 indigenous or foreign, is so relished by stock. . . . It is very 

 brittle when approaching maturity ; thus it is much broken by stock, 



