No. 97. 

 ELYMUS AREN ARIUS L. Sp. PI. i. 83 (1753). 



Plant perennial, from a thick rootstock. 



Culm erect, velvety-pubescent at the top or nearly smooth, robust, 2 to 3 feet tall. 



Leaves of the sterile shoots with loose sheaths and thick, involute blades 1 to 2 feet 

 long: leaves of the culm usually 3; sheaths rather loose, striate, smooth or pubescent, 

 nearly closed at the throat, mostly shorter than the internodes; blades involute and 

 rigid toward the point, slightly scabrid above; ligule less than 1 line long. 



Inflorescence a linear, erect, usually rigid spike 5 to 10 inches long, with 2 or 3 

 sessile, appressed spikelets at each of the 12 to 18 nodes. 



SpiJcelets 3- to 5-flowered, 9 to 12 inches long ; empty glumes lance-ovate, acute or 

 subulate-pointed, pubescent, indistinctly 5-nerved, some of the nerves very prominent, 



8 to 11 lines long, the second 1 line longer than the first, each exceeding the adjacent 

 florets; floral glume lance-ovate, acute, smoothish to villous-pubescent, 7-nerved, 7 to 



9 lines long; palet oblong, bifid at the apex, pubescent on the keels, about equaling 

 the glumes, ovary pubescent; lodicules 2, lanceolate, ciliate on the margins, 2 hues 

 long. 



Plate XCV1I; a, spikelet with florets lifted out of the empty glumes and 

 spread out somewhat; b, floral glume, dorsal vieW; c, palet, ventral view; d, pistil 

 and lodicules. 



Oregon to Alaska, mostly near the coast, and on the Atlantic coast from Labrador 

 to Maine. This is evidently the same species described as Elymus mollis Trin. in 

 Spreng. Neue Entdeck. ii. 72 (1821). There is another and different E. mollis, B. Br. 

 App. Frankl. Jour. 732 (1823), which is probably the same as E. dasystachys Trin. in 

 Ledeb. Fl. Alt. i. 119 (1829). 



