May 31, 1928.] Revision of the Flora of the Bombay Presidency 638 



Popular Names : Water Grass, Mauritius Grass, Para Grass, Scotch Grass, 

 Buffalo Grass. 



Description : Perennial 1 -2*5 ra. high. Stems ascending from a sometimes 

 prostrate and copiously rooting base, stout, terete, usually many-noded and 

 sheathed high up, simple or sparingly branched, glabrous, often waxy, pruinose 

 below the nodes. Leaf-blades linear, up to 30 cm. long, 6-10 mm. broad 

 glabrous or rarely more or less hirsute, margins scabrid. Panicle oblong to 

 ovate-oblong in outline subsecund or almost quaquaversal, 6-20 cm. long; 

 common rhachis terete to semiterete, more or less deeply channelled or triquet- 

 rous upwards, scabrid along the angles, glabrous. Pacemes numerous, 

 solitary or irregularly approximate, sometimes paired or in false whorls, shortly 

 peduncled or subsessile, obliquely spreading, 7 (rarely 12) to 2 - 5 cm. long, 

 mostly compound, glabrous, greenish or tinged with purple ; rhachis fiat, with a 

 slender, raised midrib up to 1 mm. wide, villosulous at the base, otherwise 

 glabrous ; secondary racemes usually very short, and 6-3-spiculate ; pedicels 

 solitary or paired, very short, or if paired then the longer up to 1 mm. long, 

 frequently with a few setules. Spikelets laterally contiguous or discontiguous, 

 those of the secondary racemes often imbricate, oblong or lanceolate -oblong, 

 acute, 3-3 - 5 mm. long, glabrous. Involucral glumes dissimilar, lower broad- 

 ovate, acute to subacute, from less than § to not quite \ the length of the 

 spikelet, faintly 3-5-nerved, often tinged with purple ; upper corresponding in 

 outline and size to the spikelet, 5-7-nerved. Lower floral glume as long as the 

 upper involucral glume and similar to it ; pale narrowly oblong, subacute, 

 almost as long as the glume, with narrow flaps ; anthers 2 mm. long ; upper 

 floral glume slightly shorter than the spikelet, mostly 3 mm. long, oblong, 

 subacute or minutely apiculate, pale yellowish, glume and pale crustaceous, 

 very finely transversely wrinkled or almost smooth. Stigmas blackish-purple, 

 very conspicuous. 



Locality : Cultivated at Kirkee and Surat (Woodrow) and very likely in other 

 places. 



Distribution : A native of S. America and W. Africa, but introduced else- 

 where (Stapf). 



Uses : A fodder grass. See Kew Bull. (1894) , 3S4. 



3. Brachiaria ramosa. Stapf in Prain Fl. Trop. Afr ix, 542 ; Haines Bot. 

 Bihar & Orissa 1005. — Panicum ramosum, Linn. Mant. (1767), 29; Steud. 

 Syn. PL Glum, i, 97 ; Hook. f. in F.B.I, vii, 36 {partim) ; Trim. Fl. Ceyl., v, 

 140; Prain Beng. PI. 1175; Cke. ii, 932.— P. arvense, Kunth Rev. Gram, 

 i, 391, t. 109.— P. Petiveri, Dis. ii, 144. {partim) ; Baker FL Maurit. 434 ; 

 Aitchis. Cat. Panjab PL 160; Duthie Grass. N. W. Ind. 6, Fodd. Grass. 

 N. Ind. 11 ; Boiss. Fl. Or. v, 439.— P. brachylachnum, Steud. I.e. 62.— P. 

 cognatissimum, Steud. I.e. 69.— P. patens, Boj. Hort. Maurit. 365 (non Linn.).— 

 P. pygmaeum, Boj. I.e.— P. Helopus, Watt. Diet. Econ. Prod, vi, part 1, 10 

 {partim).— P. umbrosum, Retz. Obs. 4 (1786), 16 ; Roxb. Fl. Ind. i, 297. 



Description : Cke. ii, 932.— Stapf points out that this species occurs in a glab- 

 rous and a pubescent state, and that the original specimen in Linnaeus' herbarium 

 represents the former. ' The pubescence,' he says, ' if present, extends gener- 

 ally to the culms, the leaves, the axes of the inflorescence and the spikelets, the 

 upper glume [upper involucral glume] and lower valve [lower floral glume]. 

 On the blades it may be scanty and disappear with age. It does not seem to be 

 correlated with any other character, and the area of the glabrous and pubescent 

 states overlap completely, in fact both have been taken in the same collecting.' 



He mentions another curious modification in which the lower floral glume is 

 more firmly membranous to crustaceous and faintly transversely rugose and 

 thus more or less resembles the upper floral glume (not the upper involucral 

 glume as is normally the case). It has been collected in India and W. Africa. 



Locality-. Sind: Chachra (Mamlatdar of Chachra !) ; Shahabander (Karachi 

 P.O.C. of Shahabander!); Sangarh (Sabnis B901!, B887 !) ; Nasarpur, 

 clayey soil (Sabnis B1057 !).— Gujarat : Ahmedabad (Herb. S.X.C. 2165!); 

 Mausari (Mamlatdar of Mausari!); Sumrasar, Cutch (Blatter 3756!).— 

 Khandesh : Tamer, Tapti bank (Blatter & Hallberg 5172 !) ; Antroli, Bori 

 River (Blatter & Hallberg 5149!); Toranmal (McCann AU2 \) .—Konkan : 

 Malabar Hill (McCann !) ; Versova (McCann 9588 !) ; Byculla (McCann 9586 !) ; 

 Sion (McCann 8689 !) ; Bandra Hill, in fallow fields (Vakil A115 \).-Deccan : 

 Khandala (Sedgwick 2631!); Poona (Woodrow!); Lina Hill, Nasik District 



[17] 



