Upham.J 
150 
[May 21, 
stations, are found respectively at Redwood Falls and Montevideo, 
Minn., about 125 and 150 miles farther west. 
The families and genera of these lists have been arranged as in 
the newly revised sixth edition of Gray’s Manual, in which, and in 
Coulter’s Manual of the Rocky Mountain Region, the general areas 
of the several species are briefly stated. For more definite notes of 
the relative abundance and geographic limits, or localities of known 
occurrence, of the species in British America, the student should 
consult the Catalogue of Canadian Plants, by Prof. John Macoun, 
published by the Geological and Natural History Survey of Canada ; 
and similar details in- Minnesota, including the southeastern part 
of the Red river basin, are given in my Catalogue of the Flora of 
Minnesota, published in the Twelfth Annual Report, for 1883, of 
the Geological and Natural History Survey of that state. 
Grasses and. flowers of the prairie . — Where lately herds of count- 
less buffaloes grazed, wheat fields now extend far as the eye can 
see on the fertile flat expanse of the Red river valley, and the ranch- 
man’s cattle, horses, and sheep range over the plains that stretch 
west toward the mountains. On this northeastern border of the 
great prairie region of the continent, the most plentiful and valu- 
able grasses, with notes of their habit of growth and comparative 
importance, are as follows. 
PRINCIPAL GRASSES IN THE BASIN OF THE RED RIVER. 
Spartina cynosuroides, Willd., the prevailing and often the only 
grass of “sloughs” (which is the term commonly applied to 
miry depressions of the prairie) , making good hay ; also largely 
used as fuel by immigrants in many districts remote from timber 
and railways, and as thatch by Mennonite colonists in Manitoba. 
Beckmannia erucieformis, Host, var. uniflora, Scribner, frequent 
or common on wet ground, where water stands a part of the year, 
from Port Arthur, Lake Superior, to the Rocky Mountains ; ex- 
tending northeast to Hudson bay and lake Mistassini. 
Panicum capillare, L., common along streams, and in sandy cul- 
tivated fields. 
Panicum virgatum, L., frequent, often abundant, on somewhat 
moist portions of the prairie, especially in southwestern Minnesota 
and South Dakota. 
Andropogon furcatus, Mukl., abundant on rather dry tracts in 
South and North Dakota, where it is usually called “Blue Joint.” 
