26 Bulletin VI I. 1. 



6 Andropogon macrourus. Michx. Brook grass. 



Plate III. Figure 11. 



A stout perennial grass, two to four feet high, with the culms 

 somewhat compressed near the base and a more or less elongated 

 dense panicle, the numerous compound branches usually very- 

 much crowded above by the shortening of the nodes of the com- 

 mon rachis, giving the grass the appearance of being "bushy- 

 branched" at the summit. Sheaths of the sterile shoots and 

 those of the lower culm leaves compressed, imbricated, smooth, 

 or more or less hairy; leaf-blade of the sterile shoots eight to twenty 

 inches long, those of the flowering culm shorter and two to five lines 

 wide. Panicle four to twenty inches long, the nodes, as well as 

 those of the erect and more or le^^s fastigiate branches usually bar- 

 bate with rather long, soft hairs. The sheathing bracts at the 

 base of tne racemes one-half to one and one-half inches long, usu- 

 ally scabrous, especially along the mid-nerve. Racemes in pairs, 

 one half to one inch long, the filiform plumose-hairy joints shorter 

 than the sessile spikelet. Sterile spikelet reduced to a minute 

 bract or short awn, its slender, plumose pedicel longer than the 

 sess le spikelet. Sessile or hermaphrodite spikelet about two lines 

 long, narrowly lanceolate. First glume tapering from near the 

 base to the very narrow, entire or minutely bimucronate apex, two- 

 keeled, the keels aculeolate-ciliate above, callus with a few short 

 hairs; second glume lanceolate, acute, keeled above and scabrous 

 on the keel and imperfectly ciliate along the hyaline margins; third 

 glume lanceolate, acute, hyaline, ciliate along the margfins, a little 

 shorter than the second; fourth glume hyaline, about the length of 

 the third, ciliate along the margins, awned between the acute 

 divisions of the bifid apex. Awn slightly twisted or flexuose 

 near the base when dry, straight and very slender above, six to 

 seven lines long. Palea minute or none. 



This is rather a stout-growing species, similar in habit to broom- 

 sedge, but more robust, and although pretty generally distributed 

 over the State, it is far less common than that grass. It blooms 

 from September to October. 



7. A. nutans Linn. (Sorg/ium nutans A. Gray). . Indian-grass. 



Plate III. Figure 12. 



Culms simple, three to five feet high, terete, smooth, often 

 bearded at the nodes. Sheaths smooth, extending into a rigid 

 ligule one to three lines long; leaf-blade narrowly lanceolate, 

 three to eight lines wide, ten inches to two feet long, narrowed at 

 the base and tapering into a long, slender apex. Panicle six to 

 twelve inches long, lax, or sometimes rather densely-flowered, 

 nodding at the apex; primary branches solitary, straight ascend- 

 ing, repeatedly branching from the base; ultimate branches fili- 

 form and a little pilose below the spikelets. straight, or somewhat 

 flexuose. Racemes short, one- to four-jointed (bearing one to four 

 spikelets), joints filiform, flexuose, shcfrter than the spikelets, cili- 

 ate. Spikelets three to four lines long, shining, usually pale, red- 

 dish brown (sometimes very dark brown), lanceolate; first glume 



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