[From the Journal of' the Bombay Natural Hist. Soc, May 31, 1928.] 



REVISION OF 

 THE FLORA OF THE BOMBAY PRESIDENCY 



BY 



E. Blatter, s-j., Ph.D., f.l.s. 

 PART VI 

 GRAMINE.-E 



BY 



E. Blatter and C. McCann 



{Continued from p. 435 of this Volume) 



38. - Heteropogon, Pers. ; Stapf in Prain Fl. Trop. Afr. ix, 410. 



Perennial or annual grasses, with simple or more often upwards branched 

 culms ; branches few to many, mostly flowering and gathered into a spatheate 

 panicle ; racemes conspicuously dorsiventral, the bases of the male (or neuter] 

 spikelets subimbricate on the back of the raceme, their upper parts bending 

 forward around the sides, forming a hollow in which the fertile spikelets are 

 enclosed, with their awns exserted an'ticously and often intertwisted. Spikelets 

 2-nate, those of the lower (1 to many) pairs alile in sex and shape, male or 

 neuter, of the upper pairs differing in sex and shape, one of each pair sessile, 

 the other pedicelled on the many-jointed rhachis of solitary racemes, terminat- 

 ing the culms and their upper branches ; rhachis, tough or upwards tardily 

 disarticulating and glabrous between the homogamous pairs, readily disarticulat- 

 ing above them ; homogamous pairs long- persistent, the spikelets of the 

 heterogamous pairs falling separately, the pedicelled with the pedicel, the 

 sessile with the adjacent joint and the adjacent pedicel or its base. Sessile 

 spikelets subcylindric, awned ; callus long, pungent, densely bearded upwards. 

 Involucral glumes equal, the lower coriaceous rarely chartaceous, more or less 

 tightly involute, quite keelless, nerves obscure, often connected by few trans- 

 verse nerves in the upper part ; upper with a deep longitudinal groove on each 

 side, coriaceous, rarely chartaceous, between them, thinner towards the margins, 

 membranous at the tips, 3-nerved. Lower floral glume hyaline, nerveless, upper 

 stipitiform from a hyaline very slender base, cartilaginous upwards and passing 

 into a usually stout geniculate awn. Pale small or absent. Lodicules large or more 

 or less reduced, to very minute. Stamens 3, often rudimentary or absent. Stigmas 

 exserted terminally or laterally. Grain more or less linear in outline, subterete, 

 slightly dorsally compressed ; embryo somewhat exceeding the middle of the 

 grain. Pedicelled spikelets male or neuter, dorsally flattened, usually slightly 

 asymmetric, and often somewhat twisted, muticous, imbricate. Lower involu- 

 cral glume herbaceous, many-nerved, winged upwards from one or both keels ; 

 upper membranous, lanceolate- oblong, acute, 3-nerved. Floral glumes 

 hyaline, 1-nerved, well developed or more or less reduced. Stamens 3 or 0- 



Species about 6, in the tropical and subtropical regions of the whole world. 



Cke. describes four species under Andropogon, viz. A. polystachyos , Roxb., 

 A. triticeus, R- Br., A. Ritchiei, Hook, f., and A. contortus, Linn. We trans- 

 fer these to Heteropogon and add Heteropogon oliganthus, Blatter & McCann. 

 A. Not more than 30 cm. high 



I. Upper involucral glume of pedicelled 



spikelet 1-3-nerved ... ... 1- H. oliganthus. 



II. Upper involucral glume of pedicelled 



spikelet 5-nerved ... ... 2. H. polystachyos. 



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