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The true grasses are monocot (class Liliopsida) plants of the family Poaceae (formerly Graminae). There are some 600 genera and perhaps 10,000 species of grasses. It is estimated grasslands comprise 20% of the vegetation cover of the earth. This family is the most important of all plant families to human economies, including lawn and forage grasses, the staple food grains grown around the world, and bamboo, widely used for construction throughout Asia.
Grasses generally have the following characteristics:
- Typically hollow stems (called culms), plugged at intervals (the nodes).
- Leaves, arising at nodes, alternate, distichous (in one plane) or rarely spiral, and parallel-veined.
- Leaves differentiated into a lower sheath hugging the stem for a distance and a blade with margin usually entire; a ligule (a membranous appendage or ring of hairs) lies at the junction between sheath and blade.
- Flowers small (called florets), lacking petals, and grouped into spikeletsA raceme is a type of inflorescence that is unbranched and indeterminate and bears pedicellate flowers (having short floral stalks called pedicels along the axis. In botany, axis means a shoot, in this case one bearing the flowers. In a raceme, the oldest arranged in a panicleA panicle is a compound raceme — a branched, indeterminate inflorescence with pedicellate flowers attached along the secondary branches (in another words, a branched cluster of flowers in which the branches are racemes . This type of inflorescence is foun, racemeA raceme is a type of inflorescence that is unbranched and indeterminate and bears pedicellate flowers (having short floral stalks called pedicels along the axis. In botany, axis means a shoot, in this case one bearing the flowers. In a raceme, the oldest, spikeA raceme is a type of inflorescence that is unbranched and indeterminate and bears pedicellate flowers (having short floral stalks called pedicels along the axis. In botany, axis means a shoot, in this case one bearing the flowers. In a raceme, the oldest, or headSome dictionaries define close to thirty meanings of the word head . However, a majority of usages are associated with the connotation of forward, top, essential, control, etc. which are derived from attributes of an animal head (or brain). In anatomy, th; the flowers windFor the 1928 film, see The Wind. Wind in the most general sense, is the movement of air. It occurs at all scales, from local breezes generated by heating of land surfaces and lasting tens of minutes to global winds resulting from solar heating of the plan- pollinatedPollination is an important step in the reproduction of seed plants: the transfer of pollen grains (male gametes) to the plant carpel, the structure that contains the ovule (female gamete). The receptive part of the carpel is called a stigma in the flower.
- Fruit a caryopsis (also called a grain).
Agricultural grasses grown for food production are called cereals.
Cereals constitute the major source of calories for humans, and include rice in India and the Far East, maize in Mexico, and wheat and barley in Europe and North America. Staple food grains are often called corn.
Some commonly known grass plants are:
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