Order GRAMINE^. 

 Genus, Triticiim ; Sub- Order, Hordiaceic. 



2. TRITICDM SCABRUM. 



BLUE WHEAT GRASS. 



(Plate LVII.) 



FFSTUCA SCA.BRA, Labill, PI. Nov. Holl., I., 22, t. 26. TRITICUM 

 SCABRUM, R. Brown, Prod. 178, Hook, fil., Fl. Tasm., II., 128. 

 AGROPYRUM SCABRUM, Beauv, Bentham, Fl. Austral., VII., 665. 

 TRITICUM SCABRUM, R. Brown, Hook. fil. Fl. N.Z., L, 311. TRITICUM 

 SCABRUM, R. Brown, Hook. fil. Handb. Fl. N.Z., I., 342. 



A LARGE tufted, blueish-green grass. Flowers December March. 

 Annual or perennial. Culms erect, prostrate at the base, 3 1 8 inches 

 high, smooth, striated. Leaves 2 8 inches long, flat or involute, 

 smooth or scabrid, sheathing leaves long, striate, ligule o. Spike 2 6 

 nches long. Spikelets 2 8, with the awn i \ 2\ inches long, 6 10 

 flowered, erect, alternate, scabrid. Empty glumes unequal, 5-nerved, 

 much smaller than the flowering. Flowering glume tapering into a long 

 awn, 3 5 lines as long as the glume, 5-nerved ; awn flexuous, straight 

 or curved. Palea obtuse, 2-nerved. Scale oblique, or unequally bifid, 

 ciliate. Ovary crowned on the top with a mass of glutinous hairs, 

 which scales off from the grain. Styles connected below. DISTRIBUTION 

 OF SPECIES : AUSTRALIA, TASMANIA, NEW ZEALAND. 



An abundant grass in both islands, from sea level to 3000 feet altitude. It 

 varies much in size and character, being smaller and more glabrous near the sea, 

 and varying much in the size of the spikelets in inland districts. The species of 

 Triticum are considered as annuals in New Zealand, but this must be accepted 

 with a reservation, as it is doubtful if a true annual grass exists in the islands, 

 the cool and moist climate of many inland localities, enabling grasses to maintain 

 a continued growth without that amount of heat-forcing which is, at all times, 

 necessary to ripen seed the first year, for there certainly exists an inherent 

 tendency, in many grasses, to flower and seed at an early stage of their growth, 

 and before stoles are thrown out from the roots. In such cases, the plant is 



