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Showing posts from February, 2012

Dichanthelium werneri

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Like many eager Sasquatch documentarians before me, I feel compelled to share a video of an organism whose existence is denied by the scientific community. If you know Dichanthelium linearifolium, this creature should look different to you for reasons I point out in the video. Dichanthelium werneri had a brief but glorious history as a species until an uncharacteristically brash M.L. Fernald (1934) sunk it as a variety of D. linearifolium. I usually enjoy Fernald's take on botanical matters, but he really stepped over the limits of decency in his dealings with Panic Grasses. Many modern workers have buried it completely, largely based on Fernald's inertia I fear. With the exception of the treatment found in Hitchcock and Chase's "North American Species of Panicum" (from 1910), everyone says it is just a glabrous version of D. linearifolium. However, Hitchcock and Chase explain that the type specimen is in fact pubescent on the nodes and that this solid species mor