The Gramineae

Abstract

There is no doubt that the Gramineae are the most important plant family in both the scientific and economic sense. They are pre-eminent on the score of absolute completeness of distribution (Good, 1964), and therefore excellent material for the study of taxonomic history and geography. Not only are members of this family found over the widest extremes of altitude and latitude, but their degree of distribution within this general range is particularly dense and continuous. Practically alone among flowering plants, the grasses now form a dominant element in the vegetation over great areas of the world, and almost everywhere else their proportion in the natural vegetation is high. Hubbard (1968) estimates that there are about 620 genera and 10,000 species in the whole world.