40 Bulletin VII. 1. 



with densely-flowered panicles. Culms smooth, often branching 

 near the base; sheaths loose, very smooth, or sometimes densely 

 hispid; ligule none; leaves rather broad, flat, six inches to one or 

 two feet long, smooth or scabrous on the surfaces, margins serru- 

 late. Spikelets densely and irregularly crowded in three or four 

 rows along one side of the short spike-like branches of the panicle; 

 these branches, five to fifteen or twenty in number, are usually 

 simple, the lowermost one to three inches long, becoming shorter 

 and more crowded above, usually erect or ascending. Spikelets 

 about one and one-half lines long; first glume one-fourth to one- 

 half the length of the spikelets, acute or mucronate-pointed, three- 

 nerved; second and third glumes smooth, pubescent or muricate- 

 hispid along the nerves; the second five-nerved, awnless or short- 

 awned; the third seven-nerved, at least near the tip, awnless or 

 sometimes long-awned, and with a palea in its axil; fourth or 

 fruiting glume smooth, awnless, or short awn-pointed. 



A well-known annual of rank growth, common in rich cultivated 

 lands, especially around dwellings. Some apparently native forms, 

 usually with long awned spikelets, are found along water-courses, 

 etc. It seeds freely, makes rapid growth during the summer, and 

 on bottom lands yields abundantly. It sometimes affords the 

 farmer a good crop of fair hay from land which but for the spon- 

 taneous growth of this grass would have yielded him nothing. In 

 many sections, however. Barnyard-grass is only regarded as a weed. 



5. Panicum colonum Linn. 



Plate VIII. Figure 30. 



A rather slender annual, closely resembling Barnyard-grass, but 

 more slender throughout. Sheaths and leaves smooth, with scab- 

 rous margins. Spikes four to nine, rather distant, the lower about 

 an inch long, spreading or erect. Spikelets with the outer glumes 

 pubescent, simply acute or mucronate-pointed. 



This is regarded by some authors as only a variety of P. crus- 

 galli. It grows in similar stations, but is much less common. 



6. Panicum gibbum Ell. 



Plate VIII. Figure 31. 



A stoloniferous perennial, with ascending leafy culms, one to 

 three feet high, and densely flowered, almost spike-like panicles. 

 Culms rather slender, smooth, more or less diffusely branched. 

 Sheaths shorter than the internodes, ciliate along the margins, 

 usually bearded at the throat, the lower more or less papillate-pi- 

 lose or subhispid with spreading hairs, the upper smooth; ligule 

 very short, minutely ciliate-fringed, broader than the abruptly 

 contracted base of theleaf and subauriculate; leaf-blade lanceolate, 

 acute, abruptly contracted at the subcordate base into a very short 

 broadly margined petiole-like connection with the sheath, two to 

 six inches long, three to eight lines wide, the upper surface often 

 thinly pilose near the base, margins scabrous, ciliate near the base. 

 Panicle sub-cylindrical or fusiform, four to six inches long, the 



