GENERA OP GRASSES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



153 



The single species (fig. 87) is a tufted grass about a foot high, 

 found on open or rocky soil at middle altitudes from Colorado to 

 central Mexico. It is a palatable grass, sufficiently abundant in places 



to be of importance. Until recent 

 years the species was included in 

 Sporobolus. 



71. CKYPSIS Ait. 



Spikelets 1 -flowered, the rachilla 

 disarticulating below the glumes; 

 glumes about equal, narrow, acute; 

 lemma broad, thin, awnless; palea 

 similar to the lemma, about as long, 

 2-nerved, readily splitting between 

 the nerves; fruit a utricle, the seed 

 free from the thin pericarp. 



A spreading annual, with capitate 

 inflorescences in the axils of broad 

 bracts, these being enlarged sheaths 

 with short rigid blades. Species 

 one, in the Mediterranean region; 

 sparingly introduced into the United 

 States. 



Type species: Schoenus aculeatus L. 



Crypsis Ait., Hort. Kew. 1: 48. 1789. 

 A single species is mentioned, with two 

 varieties or forms, a (the equivalent of 

 the species), based on Schoenus aculeatus 

 L., and j3, based on Phlewm schoenoides 

 L. The first is the type. 



Bentham and Hooker 1 state 

 that the spikelet has four 

 glumes and no palea. Hackel 2 

 states that the palea is 1-nerved. 

 Our specimens show an evi- 

 dently 2-nerved palea. 



FIG. 87. Blepharoneuron tricholepis. riant, X I ; spike- 

 let and floret, X 5. 



'Gen. PI. 8: 1139. 1883. 



2 Engl. and Prantl, Pflanzenfam. 2 2 : 48. 1887 J _ 



