Of awns, glumes and panicles
When Boyd was in college he took a class called agrostology. Imagine spending a whole college quarter learning the basics of the study of grasses. The main book in the class weighs in at almost 3-1/4 lbs. Yes, we know this because the book is still on Boyd’s bookshelf and we weighed it. You probably can name more grasses than you think: bamboo, barley, Kentucky bluegrass, cheatgrass just to get you started. Some you probably haven’t heard of: hairgrass, dropseed, bristlegrass. Agrostologists (yes there are such people) and agrostology students learn to tell the 12,000 species of grass (worldwide) apart by the nature of the awn, glumes and panicles, among other features. Don’t worry we won’t make you look up those terms. but we do want to give you a small taste of the world of Poaceae (the grass family). Boyd gathered the following examples here in Central Oregon. We hope this stimulates a desire to look a little more closely at those “weeds” along the trail and road as you get outside and enjoy the summer.