Grassland Agriculture & Plant Botany Glossary

Vocabulary flashcards covering plant anatomy, grass and legume terminology, and forage concepts.

Annual

Plant that completes its life cycle from seed in one (year) season.

Annual, Winter

Plant species that initiates growth in the fall, lives overwinter, and dies after producing seed the following season.

Auricle

Earlike lobe at the base of leaf blades of certain grass species.

Awn

Bristle-like growth extending from the lemma of a floret.

Blade

The expanded part of a leaf; that part above the sheath and away from the stem.

Biennial

Plant that normally requires two years to reach maturity; basal leaves are produced in the first year, while floral structures develop and produce seed in the second year.

Bunchgrass

Grass that propagates by seed only; thin stands appear to be in clumps.

Caryopsis

Small, one seeded, dry fruit with a thin pericarp surrounding and adhering to the seed (grain) or fruit of grasses.

Cilia

Hair-like structures.

Collar

Where leaf sheath and leaf blade join.

Cool-season grass

Grass species adapted to rapid growth during the cool, moist periods of the year; usually dormant during hot weather or injured by it.

Corm

Bulblike, short, fleshy, solid stem base, e.g., timothy.

Culm

Jointed stem of a grass.

Dehulled seed

Seed from which pods, glumes, lemma, and palea have been removed, as sometimes with lespedeza and timothy; also often ambiguously referred to as "hulled" seed.

Floret

In grasses, the lemma and palea with enclosed stamens and pistil. In legumes, the individual flower, usually belonging to a cluster.

Forage

Herbaceous plants or plant parts fed to domestic animals (generally, the term refers to such material as pasturage, hay, silage, dehy, and green chop in contrast to less digestible plant material known as "roughage and/or 'browse", plants of a woody nature); to graze.

Glabrous

Smooth; having a surface devoid of hair or pubescence.

Glumes

The lowest bracts of a grass spikelet which are empty. Usually there are two per spikelet in grasses.

Grass

Botanically, any plant of the family Gramineae. Generally, in grassland agriculture, the term does not include cereals when grown or grain.

Graze

Partial defoliation of forage plants by the animal; to feed animals on growing grass or herbage; to forage. See also Pasture.

Green chop

Mechanically harvested forage fed to animals while it is fresh and succulent. Preferred to "soiling," "zero grazing," or "green feed."

Green manure

Crop grown and plowed under to improve the soil.

Hay

Entire herbage of forage plants, sometimes including seed of grasses and legumes, that is harvested and dried for animal feed.

Haylage

Product resulting from ensiling forage with about 45% moisture in the absence of oxygen.

Hilum

Scar on the seed left by the stalk that attached the seed to the placenta.

Inflorescence

Flowering part of a plant.

Internode

The part of a plant stem between joints or nodes.

Legume

Plant member of the family Leguminosae, with the characteristic of forming nitrogen-fixing nodules on its roots, in this way making use of atmospheric nitrogen possible.

Lemma

Chaffy bract or scale away from the stem and enclosing the seed (Palea on the other side).

Ligule

Tongue-like, thin, and specialized tissue extending beyond the sheath and seen at the base of the leaf blade of some grass species.

Midrib

The central vein of a leaf.