MANUAL OF THE GRASSES OF THE UNITED STATES 



4. Gymnopogon floridanus Swal- 

 len. (Fig. 755.) Plants in small tufts, 

 commonly purple below; culms 15 to 

 45 cm. tall; sheaths glabrous, over- 

 lapping, and crowded toward the base, 

 minutely hairy in the throat, the up- 

 permost elongate; blades firm, mostly 

 about 3 cm. long, 2 to 4 mm. wide, 

 sometimes to 6 cm. long and 6 mm. 

 wide, flat, stiffly spreading; spikes 5 

 to 20, very slender, 10 to 15 cm. long, 

 spreading or reflexed, spikelet-bearing 

 to the base or nearly so; spikelets 2- 

 or 3-flowered, 3 to 5 mm. long; glumes 

 about equal, acuminate, as long as the 

 florets, not spreading; lemma 2 to 2.2 

 mm. long. QJ. — Sandy prairies and 

 pine barrens, peninsular Florida. 



519 



Figure 755. — Gymnopogon floridanus. Panicle, X 1; 

 florets, X 5. (Type.) 



110. CHLORIS Swartz. Fingergrass 



Spikelets with 1 perfect floret, sessile, in 2 rows along one side of a con- 

 tinuous rachis, the rachilla disarticulating above the glumes, produced beyond 

 the perfect floret and bearing 1 to several reduced florets consisting of empty 

 lemmas (a few species occasionally with a second fertile floret), these often 

 truncate, and, if more than 1, the smaller ones usually enclosed in the lower, 

 forming a somewhat club-shaped rudiment; glumes somewhat unequal, the 

 first shorter, narrow, acute ; lemma keeled, usually broad, 1- to 5-nerved, often 

 villous on the callus and villous or long-ciliate on the keel or marginal nerves, 

 awned from between the short teeth of a bifid apex, the awn slender or some- 

 times reduced to a mucro, the sterile lemmas awned or awnless. Tufted 

 perennials or sometimes annuals with flat or folded scabrous blades and 2 to 

 several, sometimes showy and feathery, spikes aggregate at the summit of the 

 culms. Type species, Chloris cruciata (L.) Swartz. Named for Greek Chloris, 

 the goddess of flowers. 



Several species are found on the plains of Texas, where they form part of the 

 forage for grazing animals. C. virgata is a rather common annual weed in the 

 Southwest, especially in alfalfa fields. It may be locally abundant and then 

 furnishes considerable forage. C. gayana, Rhodes grass, is cultivated in the 

 irrigated regions of the Southwest, where it is valuable as a meadow grass. 

 It is also used in the Hawaiian Islands on some ranches in the drier regions. 

 In a few species 2 or 3 internodes of the culm may be greatly reduced, bringing 

 the nodes and sheaths close together. 



Lemmas firm, dark brown, awnless or mucronate. Perennials with strongly compressed 



