No. 24 
STIPA FLEXUOSA Vasey. 
Culms closely set on a short horizontal rootstock with slender roots, erect, u to 
3 feet high, slender, terete, smooth, unbranched. 
Leaves of the stem 2to4; sheaths smooth, close, usually imbricated; blades about 
1 line broad, a few inches to 1 foot long, involute or the upper flat, glabrous on 
the back, minutely pubescent on the upper surface, hairy at the angle of the 
ligule; ligules membranaceous, 1 to 2 lines long, facecvabe when old, broader than 
the blade. 
Inflorescence paniculate. Panicle 6 to 12 inches long, erect; rachis slender, ter- 
ete, glabrous; branches slender, flexuous, few-angled, scabrous, bearing towards 
the apex a few pedicelled spikelets. 
Spikelets single, 1-flowered, on pedicels about ae long, lanceolate, awl-shaped 
when closed, 6 to 9 lines long exclusive of the aw 
Glumes 3; first narrowly lanceolate, acute, sifting glabrous, 1-nerved 
or with 2 lateral nerves at the base, hyaline above, green or purple below, as 
long as the spikelet; second similar, about one-fifth shorter, 3- to 5-nerved; third 
(flowering) about 24 lines long closely involute about the flower into an awl-shaped 
terete body, villous on the outside, coriaceous at maturity, 5-nerved apex produced 
into a slender scabrous awn twisted ina right-handed spiral for about 5 lines, then 
_ bent, then twisted as before for about 33 lines, then bent, and above the second 
bend not twisted. Rachilla elongated between the second and third glumes to the 
length of } line, villous. 
Flower hermaphrodite. Palet about one-third the length of the glume, oblong, 
obtuse, hyaline. Stamens 3; anthers linear, 1 to 14 lines long, apex of each cell of 
the anther bearing a small tuft of hairs. Stigmas rather short, oblong. 
Grain awl-shaped, about 2 lines long, inclosed in the glume, rachilla disarticu- 
lating just above the second glume, detached portion ending in a sharp point. 
PLATE XXIV; a, and }, spikelet, the parts spread open and the upper portions 
of the rachilla detached at the point of disarticulation. The figure does not show 
the regular bends in the awn, nor the tufts of hairs at the apex of the anther cells. 
This is more slender than S. avenacea, with smaller flowers, the flowering glume 
pubescent throughout, and the apex crowned with a row of white hairs, 
