54 KAXSAS IS TATE BOAKD OF AGBICULTUBE. 



elongated, and the veins or ribs are parallel with each other and extend the entire 

 length. The sheath completely surrounds the stem but the edges are usually free, 

 i. e., not united to each other. 



The Flowee Cluster. — The flower cluster may be in the form of a dense or 

 loose spike, or it may be more branching and open, in which case it is called a 

 panicle. 



The Spikelet. — The small isolated clusters of the panicle, or the separate por- 

 tions of the spike, are called spikelets. 



The Outeb Glumes. — If a spikelet be examined, there will be found on opposite 

 sides at its base two chaffy scales or bracts that are called the outer glumes or empty 

 glumes. The outer glumes may be equal or unequal or longer or shorter than the 

 spikelet; occasionally one is extremely small or wanting. 



The Flowee. — Above the outer glumes, and subtended by them, are the so-called 

 flowers, sometimes one only but oftener two or more in each spikelet. Each flower 

 has two bract-like or chaffy parts and other organs as explained below. 



The Flowebing Glume and Palet. — The lower and larger chaffy part of the 

 " flower" which is usually like the outer glumes in texture, is called the flowering 

 glume; the other one is usually more delicate, whitish (hyaline), more or less in- 

 closed by the flowering glume, and has in (nearly) all cases two conspicuous nerves; 

 it is folded in such a way as to make two keels or sharp angles extending from top 

 to bottom; this part is called the palet. 



The Stamens and Pistil. — Within the palet and flowering glume are found the 

 stamens (usually three, but sometimes one to six or even many.) In the center of 

 the flower is the pistil the lower part of which is the grain. The very small bodies 

 (called by the botanists "Lodicules" ) usually two in number (but often entirely ab- 

 sent) placed within the glume and palet represent the perianth, and need not be 

 heeded except by the specialist. 



The most of the grasses enumerated below were reported by Jas. H. Carruth in 

 his catalogue of Kansas plants published in the Transactions of the Kansas Academy 

 of Sciences in 1876. Many others have since been reported by various collecters. 

 Some that are given have not yet been, but are likely to be found in the State. A 

 full and reliable catalogue of Kansas grasses is yet a desideratum. 



The descriptions of the grasses have been compiled from the various publications 

 of Vasey, Scribner, Gray and other botanists. In identifying the species the plates 

 will doubtless be found of great advantage in connection with the descriptions. Dr. 

 Vasey's pamphlet, The Agricultural Grasses of the United States, contains descrip- 

 tions and plates of our commonest species. The Grasses and Forage Plants of Ne- 

 braska, published in the Report of the State Board of Agriculture, by Dr. Chas. E. Bes- 

 sey, gives many plants that grow also in Kansas. The 20 plates there given have by the 

 kindness of the author, been here reproduced, and an equal number added which 

 were obtained from the United States Department of Agriculture. The plates of 

 Munroa, Schedonnardus, and Spikelets of Eatonia were published by F. Lamson 

 Scribner in the Transactions of the Academy of Science, 1883-4; the arrangement 

 of genera is that of E. Hackel. 



II. Kansas Gbasses. 

 Tripsacum, L.— A very small genus of grasses that have stout, tall and solid culms, and very thick 

 creeping root-stocks. The flowers are in jointed spikes, the upper ones male (staminate), and the lower 

 ones female (pistillate). The staminate spikelets are sessile in pairs at each joint of the triangular 

 rachis; each spikelet contains two membranaceous male flowers, the outer glumes being coriaceous or 

 rigid. The pistillate spikelets are single and embedded in the joints of the thickened cartilaginous 

 rachis, two-flowered, the upper flower perfect, the lower neutral, the outer empty glume being thick- 

 ened and cartilaginous and the inner much thinner and pointed; the flowering glumes are thin and 

 scarious. 



