MANUAL OF THE GRASSES OF THE UNITED STATES 



601 



Figure 1267.— Distribution of 

 Paspalum boscianum. 





Paspalum scrobiculatum L. Stouter and with larger spikelets, un- 

 equally biconvex, the sterile lemma loose and wrinkled, o -Bal- 

 last, Camden, N.J.; Abilene, Tex.; Asia. 

 14. Bifida. — A single species approaching 

 Panicum; spikelets turgid; a minute first 

 glume usually developed. 

 42. Paspalum bifidum (Bertol.) Nash. (Fig. 

 1268.) Culms erect from short rhizomes, 50 to 

 120 cm tall; blades flat, 10 to 50 cm long, 3 

 to 14 mm wide, villous to nearly glabrous; 

 racemes usually 3 or 4, at first erect, 4 to 16 cm long; rachis slender, 



subflexuous; spikelets distant to 

 irregularly approximate, elliptic- 

 obovate, 3.3 to 4 mm long; sec- 

 ond glume and sterile lemma con- 

 spicuously nerved. % — Sandy 

 pine and oak woods, occasionally 

 in hammocks, nowhere common, 

 on the Coastal Plain from South 

 Carolina to Texas and Oklahoma 

 (fig. 1269). 



129. PANICUM L. Panicum 



Spikelets more or less compressed 

 dorsi vent rally, in open or compact 

 panicles, rarely racemes; glumes 2, 

 herbaceous, nerved, usually very 

 unequal, the first often minute, the 

 second typically equaling the sterile 

 lemma, the latter of the same tex- 

 ture and simulating a third glume, 

 bearing in its axil a membranaceous 

 or hyaline palea and sometimes a 

 staminate flower, the palea rarely 

 wanting; fertile lemma charta- 

 ceous-indurate, t^-pieally obtuse, 

 the nerves obsolete, the margins in- 

 rolled over an enclosed palea of the 

 same texture. Annuals or peren- 

 nials of various habit. T}'pe spe- 

 cies, Panicum miliaceum. Pani- 

 cum, an old Latin name for the 

 (Cu?tiss common millet (Setaria italica). 



Panicum miliaceum, proso millet, 



is cultivated to a limited extent in this country for forage. In Europe 



it is sometimes cultivated for the seed which is 



used for food. Two species are commonly culti- 

 vated in the lowland tropics for forage, P. 



maximum, Guinea grass, an African species, said 



to have been introduced into Jamaica in 1774, 



and P. purpurascens, Para grass, introduced 



into Brazil from Africa. Certain native species 



are constituents of wild hay or of the range. 



P. virgatum, switch grass, of the eastern half of the United States, 



Figure 1268.— Paspalum bifidum. Panicle 

 two views of spikelet, and floret, X 10. 

 5590, Fla.) 



X l; 



Figure 1269.— Distribution of 

 Paspalum bifid u m. 



