There are Septenary subfamilies:
Subfamily Arundinoideae
Subfamily Bambusoideae
Subfamily Centothecoideae
Subfamily Chloridoideae
Subfamily Panicoideae
Subfamily Pooideae
Subfamily Stipoideae
Truth grasses come monocotyledonous plants (Class Liliopsida) in the Family Poaceae, as well referred to as Gramineae. There are astir 600 genera & perchance 10,000 mintage of grasses. These are guessed grasslands comprise 20% of the vegetation handle of the globe. This personal is a first of a lot plant families to person economies, including lawn & forage grasses, the staple food grains grown around the world, & bamboo, widely used for construction throughout Asia.
Grasses typically own a as punishment characteristics:
Often hollow stems (called culms), plugged at intervals (the nodes).
Leaves, arising at nodes, alternate, distichous (in of these plane) or even seldom turbinate, & parallel-veined.
Leaves differentiated into the moo sheath hugging the stem for the few feet away & a blade sustaining margin normally stallion; the ligule (a membrane-forming appendage or even ring of hairs) lies at a junction between sheath & blade.
Little, wind-pollinated flowers (called florets) sheathed within 2 glumes (bracts), lacking petals, & grouped into spikelets, these arranged around the panicle, raceme, spike, or head.
Fruit that is a caryopsis.
Cultivation and uses
Agrarian grasses grown for human food production are known as cereals. Cereals be a major source of food energy for humans & mayhap a major source of protein, & include rice in South and Southeast Asia, maize in Central and South America, and wheat and barley in the Americas and North Eurasia. Numbers of more grasses come likewise grown for forage and fodder for animal food, particularly for sheep and cattle.
A select few unremarkably known grass plants come:
maize
wheat
rice
rye
ryegrass
sugarcane
barley
bamboo
|
Poaceae in Flowering Plant Families - University of Hawaii
Photos and short descriptions of about 20 grasses important in Hawaii.
World Grasses Database - Kew Royal Botanic Gardens
Downloadable (20 MB) morphological descriptions of some 9000 species coded in DELTA (DEscription Language for TAxonomy) format using approximately 1000 characters. Uses INTKEY software available elsewhere, a program for interactive identification and information retrieval, to generate printed descriptions of species and genera, list the occurrence of particular characters or character combinations, assist in key construction, and make identifications.
Know Your Grasses
Descriptions and ink drawings of over 70 range grasses of Texas. The TEXNAT site is an information database on natural resource management of Texas rangelands. Texas A&M Research and Extension Center in San Angelo.
Grass Genera of the World
Descriptions and illustrations of over 800 grass genera by L. Watson and M. J. Dallwitz. Includes synonyms, morphology, anatomy, physiology, phytochemistry, cytology, classification, pathogens, and distribution. Based on the DELTA system adopted by the International Taxonomic Databases Working Group.
Pooideae (Poaceae) in Australia
Database under development representing 59 genera and 303 taxa in the subfamily Pooideae (formerly, Festucoideae). Descriptions and illustrations. By C.M. Weiller, M.J. Henwood, J. Lenz and L. Watson. Uses the DELTA System.
Virtual Flora: Poaceae (Grasses)
Photo gallery and descriptions (in Swedish) of Scandinavian grasses. Database (Sök i Riksmuseets samlingar) can be searched by those unfamiliar with Swedish. Grasses are given common names in English, German, and up to four Scandinavian lanuguages, the images can be useful in any language, and the Home Page (Innehållsförteckning) provides accessibility to plant lists using internationally recognizable visual symbols.
Manual of Grasses for North America
Information about and from a project creating a taxonomic account of all grasses that have been found growing without cultivation in the continental United States and Canada plus, many cultivated species grown in the region.
Stipeae
Limited taxonomic information about this tribe of grasses, which includes Achnatherum, Aciachne, Anemanthele, Austrostipa, Jarava, Macrochloa, Nassella, Nicoraella, Oryzopsis, Piptochaetium, Ptilagrostis, Stipa, and Trikeraia.
Texas Grasses
Taxonomy, key and descriptions of genera, checklist, anatomy, and glossary.
American Bamboo Society
Descriptions of every species of bamboo sold in the United States, general information about bamboo, and links to bamboo societies around the world.
|
© 2005 GeneralAnswers.org |
|