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Festuca arundinacea Schreb. var. strict ior Hack. ? [2848]. Cf. 
also F. junci folia St. Am. Berrow sands, N. Somerset ; just 
above high water; July 16, 1931. Leaves short, rigid and 
sharply pointed. Whole plant rigid and unusual in aspect. 
Tips of leaves scabrid. Branches of panicle in pairs. Ligule 
short and truncate, if any. I have a more or less typical 
F. arundinacea Schreb. from the same stretch of sands, 
gathered the same day. — H. S. Thompson. Correct. — W. 0. 
Howarth. 
Bromus erectus Hucls. Frocester Hill, E. Gloucester, June 
20, 1931. Much branched stiff form of foliage, everywhere 
apparent there, and due perhaps to the wet season. Normal 
filiform root Jeaves also sent. Such particularly stiff vegetative 
growths have not been observed about Bristol where the plant 
is so common, though a few such were seen on July 5th in a 
pasture near Hucclecote, E. Glos. — H. S. Thompson. Yes. 
— E. D. Correct. — W. 0. Howarth. The flowerless shoots 
with short, stiff, distichous leaves are vegetative growths 
which appear abundantly in the autumn after the plants 
have shed their fruits. Occasionally a few of these growths 
can be found while the plants are in full bloom. — J. Fraser. 
Bromus erectus Huds. showing vegetative growth of barren 
shoots. Frocester Hill, E. Gloster, June 20, 1931.— Ida M. 
Roper. Correct. — W. 0. Howarth. Observed and collected 
independently of H. S. T., though both were immediately 
struck by the curious and copious growth on the hillside. — Ed. 
Mr. E. C. Wallace thinks that “ in these two gatherings the 
so-called leafy shoots are nothing but normal flowering stems 
attacked by a fungus. Many species of grass are similarly 
galled.’ And later he wrote : “ When I first saw the queer 
Bromus I pulled a stem to pieces, finding leaves deformed by 
fungus and black in colour .... More anon.” 
Mr. J. Ramsbottom, Keeper of Botany, British Museum 
(Nat. Hist.) writes to Mr. Wallace : “ The specimen of Bromus 
erectus Huds, which you send labelled Frocester, E. Glos., 
June, 1931, H. S. Thompson, is attacked by the smut fungus 
Ustilago striaeformis (West) Niessl. This fungus is not 
uncommon on Bromus erectus .” 
Bromus secalinus L. var. velutinus (Schrad.). Very plentiful 
in an oat field, near Headley, Surrey, July 17, 1931. The 
common British form of this grass, I think. — I. A. Williams, 
