Grass
Grasses, or more technically graminoids, are monocotyledonous, usually herbaceous plants with narrow leaves growing from the base. They include the "true grasses", of the Poaceae (or Gramineae) family, as well as the sedges (Cyperaceae) and the rushes (Juncaceae). The true grasses include cereals, bamboo and the grasses of lawns (turf) and grassland. Sedges include many wild marsh and grassland plants, and some cultivated ones such as water chestnut (Eleocharis dulcis) and papyrus sedge (Cyperus papyrus). Uses for graminoids include food (as grain, sprouted grain, shoots or rhizomes), drink (beer, whisky, vodka), pasture for livestock, thatch, paper, fuel, clothing, insulation, construction, sports turf, basket weaving and many others.
Read more about Grass: Ecology, Agriculture, Lawns, Gallery
Famous quotes containing the word grass:
“It had been cold since December. Snow fell, first,
At New Year and, from then until April, lay
On everything. Now it had melted, leaving
The gray grass like a pallet, closely pressed;
And dirt. The wind blew in the empty place.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“The conqueror at least; who, ere Time renders
His last award, will have the long grass grow
Above his burnt-out brain and sapless cinders.
If I might augur, I should rate but low
Their chances: they are too numerous, like the thirty
Mock tyrants, when Rome’s annals wax’d but dirty.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“Then cut down the trees when lumber grown,
And there’s your pristine earth all freed
From lovely blooming but wasteful weed
And ready again for the grass to own.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)