No. 96. 

 AGROPYRUM DIVERGENS Nees. in Steud. Syn. Gram. 347 (1855). 



Plant perennial, somewhat tufted, usually glaucous. 



Culms erect, thickened at the base, slender, smooth, 2 to 3 feet tall. 



Leaves of the sterile shoots, with long, close sheaths and involute blades 4 to C 

 inches long: leaves of the culm 2 or 3; sheaths close, truncate at the throat and nearly 

 closed, shorter than the upper internodes ; blades involute, rather rigid, pungently 

 pointed, slightly auricled, smooth, 1 to 2 lines wide, 4 to 6 inches long; ligule almost 

 obsolete. 



Inflorescence a linear, erect or slightly nodding, loose spike, with 1 sessile ap- 

 pressed spikelet at each of the 6 to 12 nodes or rarely with some of the spikelets on 

 branches. 



Spikelets 4- to 9-flowered, 6 to 10 lines long; empty glumes oblong, acute, or 

 acuminate and subulate-pointed, thick and rigid, 3- to 5-nerved, the first 3 lines long, 

 the second 1 line longer; floral glume lance-oblong, sub-acute, rather rigid but thin- 

 ner than the empty glumes, 4 to 5 lines long, 5-nerved, the outer nerves evanescent 

 at the apex, the 3 inner ones uniting and excurrent in a hispid awn curved back- 

 ward, ^ to 1J inches long; palet oblong, obtuse, strongly hispid on the keels, about 

 equaling the glume; stamens 3, with anthers 1 J to 2£ lines long; ovary pubescent; 

 grain oblong, acute at the base, flattened on one side, brown, nearly opaque, 3 lines 

 long; lodicules 2, § line long; internode of rachilla thick, clavate, smooth, 1 line 

 long. 



Plate XOVI; a, spikelet; b, empty glumes; c, floral glume; d, palet. 



Northern California to Washington and eastward to New Mexico, Colorado, and 

 Montana. The species varies considerably in the length of the awn, and is imperfectly 

 dioecious. 



