51 



represents a considerable extension of the limited range of 5. 

 nimhosa, which had been known onh' from the British Islands, 

 and at the same time adds one to the list of "Atlantic species" 

 known from Norw^ay. 

 Ithaca, X. V. 



NOTES AND NEWS 



Dr. \V. A. Cannon, of the staff of the Department of Botanical 

 Research of the Carnegie Institution, reached San Francisco in 

 the last week of April after an extended trip to Australia for the 

 prosecution of his work on the root systems of desert plants. 



A specimen of Panicum urvilleanum Kunth in the National 

 Herbarium collected by W. L. Jepson (no. 6049) near Edom in 

 the Colorado Desert, southern California, show's se\-eral spike- 

 lets bearing two sterile florets below the well-developed fertile 

 floret. The florets resemble each other as to pubescence. The 

 upper of the two is slightly longer and less pointed than the lower 

 and has a well-de\eloped palea. In the lower no palea has been 

 observed, the lemma only being present. Sixteen other speci- 

 mens from North and South America in the National Herbarium 

 have been examined but in all the spikelets appear to be normal. 

 So far as known this is the only species of Panicum showing a 

 departure from the single sterile (or staminate) floret, character- 

 istic of the tribe Paniceae. In Lasiacis anomala of the same tribe 

 recently described* the spikelets normally bear two sterile florets, 

 this being the first case known of the presence of a second sterile 

 floret in any member of the Paniceae. In Pamctim amalurum 

 Hitchc. & Chase and in species of Ichnanthus the glumes are 

 sometimes multiplied but in these there is no fertile floret, a 

 terminal staminate floret only being present. — Katharine D. 

 Kimball, Bureau of Plant Industry, U. S. Dept. Agric. 



The New York Botanical Garden is at present engaged in the 

 preparation of a descriptive guide to the collections in the eco- 

 nomic museum. In the course of its preparation, we ha\e found 

 so many omissions of common and important articles that we are 



* See Hitchcock, Journ. Washington Acad. Sci. 9: 35. 1919. 



