HITCHCOCK AND CHASE TROPICAL NORTH AMERICAN PANICUM. 503 



Fig. 87. — P. schiffneri. 

 type specimen. 



DESCRIPTION. 



Plants perennial with long branching decumbent base, rooting at the nodes; culms 

 straggling, ascending, 2 to 3 meters long, slender, more or less compressed, smooth or 

 hirsute or roughened below the nodes, producing long divaricate branches; sheaths 

 papillose-hispid especially toward the summit, sometimes glabrate below, densely 

 pubescent at the junction with the blade; ligule membranaceous-ciliate, about 0.5 

 mm. long; blades flat, rather firm, usually horizontally spreading, 10 to 15 cm. long, 

 1.2 to 2.5 cm. wide (rarely larger), narrowed to the usually unsymmetrical base, 

 gradually tapering from below the middle to an acumi- 

 nate apex, scabrous and sometimes sparsely hispid on 

 the upper surface, pubescent above the ligule, scab- 

 erulous or puberulent beneath or sometimes sparsely 

 hispid, especially along the midnerve, the fine white 

 margin undulate, scabrous; panicle 10 to 15 cm. long, 

 usually about as wide, the few slender scabrous branches 

 remote, pilose in the axils, the lower branches solitary or 

 in pairs, widely spreading or reflexed, more than half as 

 long as the very scabrous main axis, naked at the base, 

 the upper branches much shorter, ascending, the rather densely flowered short 

 branchlets appressed along the upper half or two-thirds of the branches, the bract 

 at the base of inflorescence usually well developed; spikelets short-pediceled, aggre- 

 gated, scarcely 2 mm. long, 1 mm. wide, turgid, glabrous; first glume less than one- 

 fourth as long as the spikelet; second glume and sterile lemma equal, exceeding the 

 fruit, obscurely nerved; fruit about 1.5 mm. long, 0.9 mm. wide, elliptical, sparsely 

 covered with long appressed silky hairs. 



This species resembles Panicum parvigluvie in habit and P. schmitzii and P. mrgul- 

 torum in spikelet characters. It has longer, more straggling culms than has any other 

 species of this group, and larger blades than any except P. parviglume. 



DISTRIBUTION. 



Wet shady banks and slopes, Porto Rico, AVindward Islands, and southern Mexico 

 to southern Brazil. 



Veracruz: C6rdoha„ Amer.Gr. Nat. 

 Herb. 66, distributed as P. par- 

 viglume. 



Guatemala: Cob^n, Turclheim II. 

 1326. 



Costa Rica: San Francisco de 

 Guadalupe, Jimenez in 1910. 



Panama: El Boquete, Hitchcock 

 8278, 8305. 



Porto Rico: Maricao, Chase 6198. 

 Indiera Fria, Chase 6247. Vi- 

 cinity of Cayey, C7ja.se 6745. 

 Alto de Bandera, Chase 6474. 

 St. Vincent, Eggers 6653, Smith 



Fig. 88. — Distribution of P. schiffneri. 



Windward Islands: Martinique, Hahn 616. 

 <fe Smith 1099 (K. U. Herb.). 



66. Panicum parviglurae Hack. 



Panicum parvigluvie Hack. OesteiT. Bot. Zeitschr. 51: 429. 1901; Contr. U. S. Nat. 

 Herb. 15: 126. 1910. 



Panicum conchatum Fourn. Mex. PI. 2: 25. 1886. This was previously included 

 among the doubtful species.^ A few spikelets from Schaffner's no. 204 (the type 



1 Contr. U. S. Nat. Herb. 15: 329. 1910. 



