No. 39. 

 CALAMAGROSTIS CUSICKII Vasey, Bot. Gaz. x. 224. 



Plant pereuuial, loosely tufted, witli numerous sterile shoots and few flower-bearing 

 culms, from strong creeping rootstocks. 



Culms erect, simple, smooth, 3 to 4 feet high. 



Leaves of sterile shoots with close, overlapping sheaths and flat, slightly hispid, 

 flexible blades 10 to 15 inches long. Leaves of culm 3 or 4; sheaths striate, nearly 

 smooth, half as long as the internodes, or the lower ones equaling the shorter inter- 

 nodes; blades flat, hispid on both sides, 6 to 10 inches long, 2 to 3 lines wide; ligule 

 obtuse, decurrent, 2 to 3 lines long. 



Inflorescence a rather closely flowered, oblong, erect panicle 6 inches long, 1 inch 

 thick; rays crowded in 10 to 12 semiverticillate clusters, ascending, unequal, the 

 longer (1£ inches) subdivided and bearing clusters of short-pediceled spikelets beyond 

 the middle, the shorter ray spikelet-bearing to the base. 



Spikelets narrow, acute, 2 to 2^ lines long; empty glumes lanceolate, acute or acu- 

 minate, convex, nearly smooth, rigid; first glume 1-uerved, 2 to 2£ lines long; second 

 glume obscurely 3-nerved and slightly shorter; floral glume oblong, 4-toothed at the 

 slightly cleft apex, thin, smooth, 4-nerved above, 1£ lines long; awn attached below 

 the middle, slightly exceeding the glume; hairs of the callus and very small rudiment 

 scanty, £ as long as the glume; palet oblong, obtuse, thin, 2-nerved, lh lines long. 



Plate XXXIX ; a, spike-let enlarged times ; b, empty glumes ; c, floral glume, 

 side view ; d, palet, ventral view, partly unrolled. 



Eastern Oregon, at an altitude of 5,000 to 6,000 feet. This grass produces a large 

 quantity of foliage and probably will be found useful for cultivation. 



