MANUAL OF THE GRASSES OF THE UNITED STATES 



789 



spikelet about 2 mm. long. O — 

 Open ground, fields, and waste places, 

 Georgia and Florida to Louisiana; 

 New Mexico to Arizona; tropics of 

 both hemispheres, introduced in 

 America. Furnishes some forage in 

 the Southwest. 



THEMfiDA Forsk. 



Inflorescence a flabellate cluster of 

 several short racemes, each sub- 

 tended by a spathe, the entire cluster 

 subtended by a larger spathe; ra- 

 cemes consisting of 2 approximate 

 pairs of sessile awnless staminate or 

 neuter spikelets and a single fertile 

 awned spikelet with a pair of sterile 

 pedicellate ones, the rachis disjointing 

 above the pairs of sessile staminate 

 spikelets and forming a pointed 

 callus below the fertile one. Annuals 

 or perennials. Name from the Ara- 

 bian, Thaemed. 



Theineda quadrivalvis (L.) Kuntze. 

 Kangaroo grass. Robust annual, 1 

 to 1.5 m. tall; blades flat, elongate, 

 5 to 10 cm. wide; inflorescence often 

 elongate, narrow, loose to dense, with 

 conspicuous bent brown awns 4 to 

 5 cm. long. O — Established on 

 bottom land, near Opelousas, St. 

 Landry Parish, La. Introduced in the 

 West Indies. East Indies. 



TRIBE 14. TRIPSACEAE 



165. COlX L. Jobs-tears 



Spikelets unisexual; staminate 

 spikelets 2-flowered, in twos or threes 

 on the continuous rachis, the normal 

 group consisting of a pair of sessile 

 spikelets with a single pedicellate 

 spikelet between, the latter some- 

 times reduced to a pedicel or wanting ; 

 glumes membranaceous, obscurely 

 nerved; lemma and palea hyaline; 

 stamens 3; pistillate spikelets 3 to- 

 gether, 1 fertile and 2 sterile at the 

 base of the inflorescence; glumes of 

 fertile spikelet several-nerved, hyaline 

 below, chartaceous in the upper nar- 

 row pointed part, the first very broad, 

 infolding the spikelet, the margins 

 infolded beyond the 2 lateral stronger 



pair of nerves; second glume nar- 

 rower than the first, keeled, sterile 

 lemma similar but a little narrower; 

 fertile lemma and palea hyaline; 

 sterile spikelets consisting of a single 

 narrow tubular glume as long as the 

 fertile spikelet, somewhat chartaceous. 

 Tall branched grasses with broad flat 

 blades, the monoecious inflorescences 

 numerous on long, stout peduncles, 

 these clustered in the axils of the 

 leaves, each inflorescence consisting 

 of an ovate or oval pearly-white or 

 drab, beadlike, very hard, tardily 

 deciduous involucre (much modified 

 sheathing bract) containing the pis- 

 tillate lower portion of the inflores- 

 cence, the points of the pistillate 

 spikelets and the slender axis of the 

 staminate portion of the inflorescence 

 protruding through the orifice at the 

 apex, the staminate upper portion of 

 the inflorescence 2 to 4 cm. long, 

 soon deciduous, consisting of several 

 clusters of staminate spikelets. Type 



Figure 1194. — Coix lacryma-jobi, X 1. (Cult.) 



