266 



CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM. 



DISTRIBUTION. 



Wet places, mostly sphagnum bogs or swamps, New Jersey to Georgia; also in 

 Mississippi. 



New Jersey: Forked River, Britton in 1896; Penn Place, Clute in 1899; Toms 

 River, Biclcnell in 1900; At- 

 sion, Chase 3535, 3557. 



Maryland: Beltsville, Chase 

 3739. S».i».o,.-4iAJi Cii^c^ 



North Carolina: Roanoke Is- 

 land, Chase 3227, 3234; West 

 Raleigh, Stanton, 1272; Wil- 

 sons Mills, Chase 3096-^, 3097; 

 Onslow County, Ashe in 1899, 

 Chase 3176, 3177, 3196; Wil- 

 mington, Hitchcock 1425, 

 1436 J, 1439. 



South Carolina: St. Helena Is- 

 land, Cuthhert in 1887; Orangeburg, Hitchcock 1370, 1379, 1405. 



Georgia: Bulloch County, Harper ^2^; Augusta, Cuthhert 1160; without locality, 

 Baldwin. 



" ississippi: Biloxi, Hitchcock 1067. fs i 



Fig. 292. — Distribution of P. ensifolium. 



Ok\ 



_iiJ'-*- 



158. Panicum vemale sp. nov. 



DESCRIPTION. 



Vernal plants light green, soft in texture; culms densely cespitose, 15 to 30 cm., rarely 

 to 40 cm. high, very slender, ascending or spreading, glabrous, the nodes glabrous; 

 leaves clustered at the base, the thin, rather soft blades 2 to 7 cm. long, 3 to 5 mm. 

 wide, those of the culm remote, the glabrous sheaths one-fourth to one-third as long 

 as the elongated internodes; ligules almost obsolete; blades 0.7 to 2.5 cm. long, 2 to 3 

 mm. wide, glabrous or puberulent on the lower surface, occasionally also on the upper 

 surface, at first erect, becoming spreading or reflexed; panicles finally long-exserted, 

 1.5 to 3 cm. long, nearly as wide, rather few-flowered, the flexuous 

 branches spreading; spikelets 1.4 to 1.5 mm. long, 0.8 mm. wide, 

 obovate-elliptic, subacute, pubescent; first glume about one- 

 fom-th as long as the spikelet, subacute; second glume and 

 sterile lemma scarcely as long as the fruit at maturity; fruit 1.2 

 mm. long, 0.7 to 0.8 mm. wide. ^ 



Autumnal form like the vernal form in appearance, branching 



from the base, these culms simple and soon dying to the ground, 



rarely late in the season producing a few short fascicled branchlets 



at the nodes, the scarcely reduced flat blades spreading; winter leaves numerous, soft, 



persistent during the vernal stage, linear, rather abruptly narrowed at the apex, not 



long-acuminate. 



Type U. S. National Herbarium no. 558416, collected in a "sphagnum bog. Lake 

 City, Florida, April 16, 1906," by A. S. Hitchcock (no. 1020). 



This species has been confused with P. ensifolium Baldw.,o from which it is dis- 

 tinguished by the more densely cespitose habit and light green, soft foliage, the very 

 numerous basal blades as much as 7 cm. long, flat, linear, not long-acuminate. 



"-Panicum nitidum ensifolium, as described in Chapman's Flora (Fl. South. U. S. 

 ed. 3. 586. 1897) is P. vernale. 



Fig. 293.— p. vernale. 

 From type speci- 

 men. 



