370 



WEEDS AND USEFUL PLANTS. 



Obs. There are several varieties of cultivated Eice ; some, called Up- 

 land or Mountain Eice, usually awnless,— others, with the palese com- 

 monly awned, or mucronate, cultivated in low grounds which can be 

 irrigated, or overflowed with water. The aquatic variety is one of the 

 staple crops of South Carolina. The importance of this plant, to the 

 inhabitants of the tropical regions, generally — but especially in Asia — 

 can scarcely be estimated by the residents of higher latitudes. It is be- 

 lieved that its seeds enter more largely into the nourishment of the hu- 

 man family than those of any other plant — not excepting even Wheat. 



3. ZIZA'NIA, Gronov. Indian Eice. 



[A Greek name of some plant now doubtful.] 



Flowers monoecious ; the staminate and pistillate ones in the same pani- 

 cle, both 1-flowered. Glumes wanting, or in the pistillate spikelets ru- 

 dimentary and cup-shaped. Paha herbaceo-membranaceous, convex, 

 awnless in the staminate spikelets, but tipped with a straight awn in the 

 pistillate ones. Stamens 6. Stigmas pencil-form. Stout aquatic 

 grasses ; spikelets readily separating at maturity from the club-shaped 

 pedicels with which they are articulated. 



1. Z. aquat'ioa, L. Panicle pyramidal, — the lower branches spreading, 

 bearing staminate flowers — the upper branches erect, bearing pistillate 

 flowers ; spikelets on clavate pedicels ; awns long ; caryopsis slender, 

 elongated. 



Aquatic Zizania. Water Oats. Eeed. Indian Eice. 



Root perennial. Culm 4 - 8 or 10 feet high, stout, fistular , terete, glabrous. Leaves 1-2 

 or 3 feet long, and an inch to an inch and a half wide, linear-lanceolate, keeled, smooth, 

 serrulate on the margin ; sheaths striate, smooth, the base, at the nodes, surrounded with 

 a ring of short silky appressed pubescence ; ligule rather large, elongated, erect, lanceo- 

 late, finally lacerate-dentate, often purplish. Panicle 1-2 feet long, the branches verti- 

 cillate. Pistillate spikdets about an inch long, needle-like, somewhat racemose on the 

 branches. Palece, scabrous, dark greenish-purple, the lower one closely embracing t^e 

 upper one, and terminating in a slender straight hispid awn as long as the spikelet. 



Muddy margins of tide waters, swampy rivulets, &c. : throughout the United States. 

 Fl. Aug. Fr. Sept. - Oct. 



065. This fine stout Grass is well known, along the muddy shores of 

 our tide waters, as the favorite resort of the Eeed-bird (Emberiza Oryzi- 

 vora, L.), in autumn. Mr. Elliott supposed it might be a valuable 

 grass, in overflowed or marshy meadows, — as its leaves, he says, are eaten 

 with avidity by stock of all descriptions. I do not know that it has 

 been found of much importance, in that respect, in the northern or mid- 

 dle States. The grain is gathered by the North- Western Indians by 

 beating it off into their canoes as they sail among the reeds. 



4. ALOPECU'EUS, L. Foxtail Grass. 



[Greek, Alopex,, a fox, and Oura, a tail ; in allusion to the form of the spike.] 



Spikelets 1-flowered. Glumes strongly compressed and keeled, awnless, 

 nearly equal, united at base. Lower palea equalling or shorter than the 



