: No. 44. 
DIPLACHNE RIGIDA (Munro) Vasey. (Leptochloa rigida Munro, MSS.) 
Plant perennial, from loosely tufted, bulbous base. 
Culms erect, terete, smooth, not branching, 1 to 2 feet tall. 
Leaves; radical and from radical shoots comparatively few, with short, loose, 
involute, tapering sheaths, and narrow, mostly filiform, involute, rigid, pointed 
blades, 2 to 6 inches long, pubescent, with few scattered hairs; of stem 2 or 3; 
sheaths longer than internodes, close, smooth, with blades like those of radical 
leaves ; ligule a prominent tuft of spreading hairs 1 line long. 
Sailoresceice a loose, spreading panicle 6 to 12 inches long; rachis tinialee 
smooth; branches distant, alternate, spreading or horizontal, triangular, hispid on 
the angles, with tuft of hairs at the axis, 3 to 6 inches long, bearing 5 to 8 distant, 
sessile, appressed spikelets. 
Spikelets oblanceolate, 5- to 9-flowered, 34 to 44 lines long; first glume lanceo- 
late, acute, carinate, rigid, 1-nerved, hispid on keel, 14 lines long; second glume 
lanceolate, acute, convex, 5-nerved, 2 lines long; floral glumes lanceolate, acute, 
barely, if at all, mucronate, rigid, 2 lines long, arlooth; 2 lateral nerves vanishing 
before reaching the margin, palet oblong, obtuse, rigid, 2-keeled, rae 14 lines 
long, becoming strongly arched. 
Grain oval, reddish brown. 
PLATE XLIV; a, spikelet; b, empty glumes; ¢, floral glumes, dorsal and side 
view; d, palet. 
Texas and New Mexico, northward to Kansas. 
