INFLORESCENCIi 



187 



3. Can you name any plants the buds of which serve as food for man ? 



4. How do flower buds differ in shape from leaf buds? 



5. At what season can the leaf bud and the flower bud first be 

 distinguished ? 



6. Watch any of the trees about your home and see when the buds 

 that are to develop into leaves and flowers the next year are formed. 



INFLORESCENCE 



Material. — A few typical flower clusters illustrating the definite 

 and indefinite modes of inflorescence. Some of those mentioned in 

 the text are : — 



Indefinite : hyacinth, shepherd's purse, wall flower, parsley, lilac, blue 

 grass, smartweed (^polygonum), wheat, oak, willow, clover. 



Definite : chickweed, spurge {Euphorbia, various kinds), comfrey, 

 aead nettle {Lamium amplexicaule) , etc. Any other examples illus- 

 trating the principal kinds of cluster will do as well, but the subject 

 should not be taught without an examination of at least a few living 

 specimens of each sort. 



264. Definitions. — Inflorescence is a term used to denote 

 the position and arrangement of flowers on the stem. It 

 is merely a mode of branch- 

 ing and follows the same 

 laws that govern the branch- 

 ing of ordinary stems. 



The stalk that bears a 

 flower is called by botanists 

 the peduncle. In a cluster 

 the main axis is the com; 

 mon peduncle, or rhachis, and 

 the separate flower stalks 

 pedicels. 



265. Two Kinds of Inflores- 

 cence. — The growth of 

 flower stems, like that of leaf 

 stems, is of two principal „ ^ ,. . , ^ , ,., 



■ * ' 348. — Solitary terminal flower of a lily. 



kinds, definite and indefinite, 



or as it is frequently expressed, determinate and indeter- 



