No. 00. 

 ATROPIS LEMMONI Vasey; Poa Lemmoni Vasey, Bot. Gaz. iii. 13 (1878). 



Plant perennial, tufted, light green or glaucous; roots fibrous. 



Culms erect, slender, smooth, wiry, 1 to 1£ feet tall. 



Leaves from the base numerous, with short sheaths and closely involute, pungently- 

 pointed blades, scabrid on the margins, 2 to 5 inches long: leaves of the culm usually 

 3; sheaths nearly smooth, half open at the throat, the lower ones equaling or slightly 

 exceeding the short internodes, the upper one longer, often extending to the panicle ; 

 blades involute, 1 to 3 inches long ; ligule obtuse or subacute, about 1 line long. 



Inflorescence an erect, loosely flowered, contracted and narrow or sometimes open 

 panicle 3 to 5 inches long ; rays 2 to 5 at each of the 6 to 8 nodes, slightly scabrous^ 

 erect or sometimes spreading or horizontal, unequal, 2 inches long or less, the longer 

 ones divided and spikelet-bearing beyond the middle. 



Spikelets linear-oblong, 3- to 7-flowered, 2 to 3 lines long; empty glumes ovate, 

 acute, slightly hispid on the keels, thin, the first 1-nerved, § line long, the second 3- 

 nerved and £ line longer, each extending about half the length of the adjacent florets; 

 floral glume oblong-lanceolate, irregularly crenulate or minutely denticulate near the 

 subacute apex, nearly smooth, 5-nerved, 1£ lines long; palet oblong, obtuse or slightly 

 2-toothed, minutely hispid on the keels, about equaling the glume; stamens 3; lodi- 

 cules 2, inconspicuous; intemode of rachilla slightly puberulent, ^ line long, the upper 

 joint bearing a small rudiment. 



Plate XC; a, spikelet; b, floret; c, floral glume, dorsal view. 



California to British Columbia in the mountains. This species was first described 

 as Poa Lemmoni Vasey, in Bot. Gaz. iii. 13. It is a good Atropis if Atropis is to be 

 field as a separate genus ; if not, it becomes a Olyceria rather than a Poa. If Puccinellia 

 takes precedence of Atropis, as it does according to Dr. Watson, then our plant will 

 be Puccinellia Lemmoni. 



