CAREX OYPERACEiE 713 



very short and scale-like or wanting : spikes 4-7, oblong, obtuse, narrowed 

 and Btaminate at base, 4-6 lines long, about 3 lines thick, dark brown, 

 shining, clustered but distinct in a terminal oblong bead about an inch 

 long: perig^nia erect or ascending, ovate-lanceolate, 2 lines long, rather 

 narrowly winged, the rough tapering 2-toothed beak nearly as long as the 

 body, longer and broader than the lanceolate acute membranous scale. 

 Oregon to Brit. Columbia and the Rocky Mountains. 



C. festira Dewey Sill. Journ. xxix, 246. Oespitose : stems 6 inches to 

 2 feet high, sharply angled : leaves 3-5, the upper longest, commonly shor- 

 ter than the stem, 2-3 lines wide; heads dark ferruginous, 9-12 lines long, 

 3-12 lines thick, of from 6-12or more nearly equal roundish or ovoid spikes, 

 contiguous in an oblong, or crowded in a spherical or ovoid cluster, naked 

 or subtended by a scale-like or foliaceous brace that sometimes exceeds 

 the stem; perigynia membranous, spreading or divergent, ovate, lanceo- 

 late or narrowly elliptical, attenuate to a longer or shorter obliquely cut 

 beak, narrowly winged, serrate above on the sharp margins, longer than 

 the scale. In moist meadows, California to the Arctic regions and the 

 Rocky Mountains. 



VtCr. grracilis Olney Proc. Am. Acad, viii, 407. Stems very slen- 

 der, nodding at the top, 20-30 inches high : heads oblong, 12-18 lines long, 

 of 3-6 roundish contiguous or approximate ferruginous spikes. Washing- 

 ton to California. 



Var. strlcta Bailey Mem. Torr. Bot. Club i, 51. Stems rather stiff 

 20-30 inches high : leaves stiff and the lower ones short : heads very dense 

 globular or short-ovoid, light brown, 9-12 lines long: perigynia broad 

 more or less nerved. In wet places, eastern Oregon to California. 



Yar. pachystachya Bailey 1. c. Stems 1-3 feet high, flat and weak, 

 longer than the lax leaves : heads small, globular or oblong, dull dark 

 brown, the spikes often somewhat distant, very short: perigynia spreading, 

 about equalling the ovate-lanceolate muticose brown scales. Oregon to 

 Alaska and Montana. 



C. athrostachya Olney Proc. Am. Acad, viii, 393. Cespitose: stems 

 acutely triangular, leafy, 8-24 inches high : leaves narrow, shorter than 

 the stem : bracts with an expanded strongly nerved hyaline-margined 

 base, the lov^er 3-5 foliaceous, much exceeding the stem : heads gjobose, 

 itraw-color, of 5-20 densely crowded spikes or the lowest distant : scales, 

 membranous, pale ferruginous, ovate-lanceolate, acuminate: perigynia, 

 ovate-lanceolate, attenuate to an elongated sharply bidentate beak, the 

 winged margins serrate, about as long and broad as the scale. In the 

 mountains of California to Brit. Columbia and the Rocky Mountains, 



Oedee CIX GKAMINE^ Juss. Gen. 28. (1789) 



Annual or perennial plants with usually hollow cylinirical, 

 rarely flattened, jointed stems with closed nodes, two-ranked 

 usually linear parallel-veined leaves with sheathing base, the, 

 sheatlis open on the side opposite the blade, and usually a sca- 

 ripus or cartilaginous ring called the ligule at the orifiqe of the 

 sheath, aiid small flowers in spikelets which are arranged in 

 panicles, racemes or spikes, and which consist of a shortened 

 axis called the rachella, and two or more chaff-like distichous 

 imbricated scales called glumes of which the first two are usu- 

 ally empty, in the axil of each of the others, except sometimes 

 in the uppermost, is borne a flower and a two-nerved scale called 



