No. 93. 

 FESTUCA VIRIDULA Vasey sp. nov. 



Plant perennial, tufted, with coarse, woolly roots. 



Culms erect, slender, smooth, thickened at the base, 2 to 4 feet tall. 



Leaves from the base numerous, closely involute, almost filiform, reaching nearly 

 to the panicle : leaves of the culm usually 3 ; sheaths striate, smooth, half open above, 

 shorter than the long internodes ; blades mostly fiat, scabrid above, 1 to 2 lines wide, 

 3 to 6 inches long; ligule almost obsolete. 



Inflorescence a loose, open, erect or slightly nodding panicle, 4 to 6 inches long; 

 rays mostly in twos below and single above, at the 4 to 6 nodes, hispid like the axis, 

 angular or flattened, 3 inches long or less, the longer onss Sometimes subdivided and 

 bearing 2 to 4 spikelets near the extremities, the upper ones bearing but 1 spikelet, 

 or rarely simple throughout. 



Spikelets compressed, 3- to 6-flowered, 5 to 6 lines long; first empty glume ovate, 

 acute, 1-nerved, 14; lines long; second empty glume broadly lanceolate, subacute, 

 broadly scarious-margined, 3-nerved below, 2 lines long; floral glume lance-oblong, 

 denticulate below the acute or more often mucronate apex, minutely puberulent, 

 5-nerved, 3 to 3 J lines long; palet oblong, obtuse, minutely ciliate on the keels 

 above, about equaling the glume ; internode of rachilla § hue long. 



Plate XCIII ; o, sjukelet ; b, first empty glume ; c, second empty glume ; d, floral 

 glume, dorsal view ; e, palet, ventral view, not opened ; /, panicle of one of Bolander's 

 specimens. 



California. Dr. Thurber's description in Wats. Bot. Cal. ii. 318 was erroneous, 

 in naming this grass Festuca gracillima after the Antarctic species of Hooker, as I 

 have verified by examination of original specimens in the Kew herbarium. I have 

 therefore named it F. viridula. 





