Spread of African Pasture Grasses to the American Tropics

Item Type text; Article

Authors Parsons, J. J.

Citation Parsons, J. J. (1972). Spread of African pasture grasses to the American tropics. Journal of Range Management, 25(1), 12-17.

DOI 10.2307/3896654

Publisher Society for Range Management

Journal Journal of Range Management

Rights Copyright © Society for Range Management.

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Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/647510 Spread of African Pasture Grasses variably they are more palatable to livestock than the native American to the American Tropics1 species, and more productive. Such adaptability to grazing clearly must JAMES J. PARSONS be related to their simultaneous evolutionary development with Professor of Geography, Department of Geography, University of California, Berkeley. grazing animals in their areas of origin during the late Pliocene and Pleistocene. Highlight the north coast of Colombia, on the There are no data on how much Andean spurs of eastern Venezuela, Most of the economically important of Tropical America today supports pasture grasses of the tropics have in the interior of Brazil, on the is- a grass cover. It is a patchwork originated in . Introduced into lands of the Greater Antilles-today quilt. Excluding the Amazon basin, the New World, they have often be- one sees pasture lands stretching to come naturalized, spreading rapidly it must approach 40 per cent. What the horizon, interrupted only by and widely. Six species have been part of this surface supports natu- scattered palms, remnant woodlots, principally involved in this massive ralized African species is not known. ecologic invasion. With the aid of man or linear rows of trees planted Although the vegetation maps may the face of much of the continent is originally as live fences. The tropi- not show it, grass, whether volun- gradually being changed from forest cal forest of , so long to productive grassland. teer, planted, or simply encouraged considered inviolate, is under seri- by man, is the most widespread of ous and sustained attack on count- all cover types over much of the The once limitless forests of less fronts and it must now be con- continent. Most pastures and ex- humid tropical America are rapidly sidered an important question tensive tracts of so-called savanna being converted to grasslands. Areas whether it will long endure (Stern- are, in fact, a mixture of native and newly cleared of selua or montana berg, 1968). introduced grasses. are cropped for a few years, then Tropical Africa-especially An- A half dozen species of Gramineae planted to perennial African grasses gola, Rhodesia, and the Transvaal have been principally involved to to’ form “artificial” pastures. These -has been an independent center date in this African invasion: generally have been aggressively of development for a number of colonizing species, readily dissemi- sown forage grasses, including vir- Guinea grass (Panicum maximum Jacq.), Para grass (Brachiaria mu- nated either by seed or cutting, and tually all of the important ones that they have become widely natural- may be considered truly tropical tica (Forsk.) Stapf), molasses grass (Melinis minutiflora Beauv.), jara- ized. Agriculture is thus but a (Hartley and Williams, 1956). Most temporary stage in the process by of these are said to have evolved gua ( rufa (Nees) Stapf), Kikuyu grass (Pennisetum which forest is being converted to from woodland or forest margin clandestinum Hochst.), and, most potreros, especially where grazing habitats (Cooper, 1965). Although pressure, set fires, and the purpose- originally they appear to have had recently, Pangola grass (Digitaria decumbens Stent). The first two ful cutting or uprooting of aggres- quite restricted distributions in have been longest in the Americas sive woody species promote the Africa, they are today found over dominance of grasses over second- wide areas of ‘derived’ savanna sur- and are probably the best known and most valued, although some of growth vegetation (rastrojo). There face that once supported trees. In- is a surge and ebb to the forest- troduced into America, these grasses the later arrivals have been more aggressive colonizers. grassland boundaries thus created, have proven to be explosively ag- but the relentless sweep of the gressive, invading and holding vast Guinea Grass colonos axe is producing an ever- areas wherever they have received widening sea of grass. Where once minimal support by man. For most Guinea grass (Panicum maxi- stood great tracts of lowland forest of them numerous subspecies or mum), a tall growing clump-former -along the Pan American Highway ecotypes have been recognized, but that may be propagated either by in Mexico and , on little is known regarding their dif- seeds or cutting, is undoubtedly the fering ecologic adaptations and the most widespread. It is also known 1This research has been supported by mechanisms for them (Torres, 1954). as hierba de India (Colombia), the Geography Branch, Office of The role of genetic variability, in- priuilegio or xacatdn (Mexico), and Naval Research, and the Center for cluding polyploidy, in the evolution capim coloniao (Brazil). Its estab- Latin American Studies, University of lishment in the appar- California, Berkeley. This is a revi- of these invasive species remains to sion and extension of an earlier paper, be investigated. It is noteworthy ently dates from the seventeenth “The Africanization of the New World that all appear to have the ability century. In 1684 Hans Sloane, Tropical Grasslands,” which appeared to respond to higher soil nutrient founder of the British Museum, col- in Tiibingen Geographische Studien, 34: 141-153 (1970). Received February levels than those encountered in the lected and described a “Scotch 6, 1971. regions from which they came. In- grass” in Barbados, and later in 12 AFRICAN GRASSES 13

ment of most of the north-side parishes is wholly owing to the introduction of this excellent

Jamoico 17th C.? grass, which happened by acci- dent about 50 years ago . . .”

Its spread throughout the West Indies was apparently rapid. The first scientific description of the grass, in 1786, was from a specimen collected in Guadeloupe, where it was said to have become naturalized

Panicum maximum Brochioria mutica (“In insula Guadeloupe sponte GUiNEA crescit”). By the end of the century it was described as being “exten- sively cultivated” in Antigua, where it had been introduced from Ja- maica. As early as 1813 it had reached Mississippi, approximately the northern limit of its range in the New World (Weintraub, 1953). Guinea grass appears to have been introduced to New Granada (Colombia) from Jamaica in 1797 (Restrepo, 1963). Here, too, it is reported to have been looked upon at first as only a curiosity, a source Hyporrhenia rufa Melinis minufiflora

JA RAGUA GORDURA of bird seed. Its large scale cultiva- tion was initiated in the area of Guaduas (Cundinamarca) in the FIG. 1. The spread of sonle African pasture grasses into the New World tropics. # (1823) = place of collection and date of first scientific description of species. middle Magdalena Valley in the 1830’s where it created a major land-use revolution. One observer Jamaica (Sloane, 1707, p. 106). He the seed might have arrived from called it “a true miracle grass,” sug- labeled it “gramen paniceum maxi- Brazil, with which Barbados had gesting that the unknown person mum or paniceum vulgare.” He fairly close associations at the time. responsible for its introduction to described it as 4-5 feet tall with But to be sure that Sloane’s grass that region deserved a statue “as thick nodes at six-inch intervals on was indeed Panicum maximum we high as New York’s Statue of Lib- the stalk, being: need to examine his collections in erty, illuminated by night . . . so as London. “Planted in moist ground all to be visible throughout the vast over the island for provision for Bryan Edwards, the historian of area of the new haciendas of the cattle, but grows wild . . . in the Jamaica, writing prior to 1794, was tierra caliente that it has made pro- north side [of Jamaica] and in enormously impressed with the ductive” (Rivas, 1946). It was also part of Barbadoes called Scot- rapid spread of “Guinea grass,” but from Jamaica that it reached Cen- land, whence the name. After he, like several other observers, tral America, apparently sometime its being found very useful in attributed its presence in the West around the middle of the 19th cen- Barbadoes, and had been there Indies to a casual introduction from tury. Extensive planted pastures of planted for some time, it was Africa to Jamaica in 1740 or 1741 Guinea grass began to appear in brought hither [Jamaica] and is by the captain of a slave ship who Guatemala about this time, re- now all over the island in the had intended it for use as bird seed. moister land by river sides, portedly introduced by way of the planted after the manner of Multiple introductions seem quite Soconusco coast of Chiapas (Es- sugar canes.” likely. Commenting on the revolu- ponda, 1888). In 1870 “great zacat6n tionary impact of the grass, he ob- potreros full of fat cattle” were de- Such an early English introduction served (Edwards, 1801, p. 253): scribed as one of the principal arms would fit into a pattern of fairly “ . . . Most of the grazing and widespread introductions of eco- of wealth of that republic. In breeding farms, or pens, through- nomic to the West Indies southern Mexico, too, it provided out the island [of Jamaica] were the basis for a greatly expanded from West Africa, for many slave originally created and are still ships made Barbados their first and supported by this invaluable livestock industry. A 15-fold in- often only port of call. Alternately herbage. . . . Perhaps the settle- crease in land values in the valley 14 PARSONS of the Rio Grijalva in the 1880’s Valley. It reached the Valle de1 sowing grass, which tends to form was attributed directly to the estab- Cauca in the 1860’s. A Colombian a thick and impenetrable mat that lishment of the new Guinea grass observer (Rivas, 1946) at the end snuffs out all competition. It seems potreros. The seed was introduced of the 19th century wrote of the to thrive best in disturbed areas into Costa Rica in 1885 (Pittier, great prosperity that Para and and on thin soils, especially in the 1957). Guinea grass had brought to that more temperate “coffee climates.” The time and manner of the ar- country: Molasses grass is the basis for much rival of Guinea grass into Brazil of the modern beef cattle industry “In the warm and temperate seems to be undocumented. It was lands where it was so difficult of Minas Gerais and Goias; it undoubtedly early. Indeed numer- to maintain clean pasture they covers patches of soil on the steep ous Brazilian observers have mis- are now established easily by open sides of the Sugar Loaf and takenly called it native to that means of these two grasses, which other granitic domes around Guana- country. The late Agnes Chase, au- destroy all other competing bara Bay. thority on all matters pertaining to plants.” The first scientific description of grasses, suggested that it was prob- Melinis minutiflora, published in Their introduction has been called ably introduced as bedding on slave 1812, was from a specimen collected (Ospina VAsquez, 19.55, p. 447) the ships, establishing itself wherever near Rio de Janeiro; it was not most bportant economic event in such vessels unloaded (Chase, 1944). identified in its African homeland Colombia between 1820 and the From Brazil it may have gotten to until nearly half a century later. final establishment of coffee as the Venezuela, although the more im- St. Hilaire observed it in 1816 in country’s major commercial crop portant implantation to that coun- Minas Gerais spreading so rapidly near the end of the century. The try seems to have come from Co- northward that he judged it to be introduction of Para grass into Cen- lombia in the early years of the an invader (Anon., 1922). Martius, tral America seems to have been nineteenth century. on the other hand, like many other relatively late; it reached Mexico observers, thought it must be in- from in 1872. At that time it Par6 Grass digenous to Brazil. Gardner (1830) was already in Guatemala where it observed: Pari grass (Brachiaria mutica was especially valued for milk pro- [Panicurn ~ur~urascens]), a lower duction. Today Para grass is found “It is now everywhere so com- growing stoloniferous grass spread- on moist, poorly drained soils mon in this province (Minas) it ing chiefly by runners, is to the everywhere in the American tropics, is difficult to say which of those poorly drained bottom lands of the including the irrigated pastures of excellent botanists is right: [but] tierra caliente what Guinea grass is the desert coast of Peru and along all of the agriculturalists I have spoken with on the subject agree to the better drained lower slopes. the new “penetration roads” reach- with St. Hilaire . . .” The name suggests an early connec- ing down from the Andes into the tion with the lower Amazon Valley; Amazonian lowlands. St. Hilaire had not observed it be- in the earlier literature it is some- yond 17”4O’S, but Gardner met it times referred to as Mauritius grass; Molasses Grass much further north, especially in in Oaxaca it is known as Egipto, in Melinis minutiflora or molasses the vicinity of houses. He thought Colombia as admirable. It has been grass (gordura, melado), so named that it would soon overrun the so long established in Brazil that it for its characteristic sweet odor and mountains on the Goias-Minas bor- has often been listed as a native, the gummy exudations that make der, its dissemination being greatly but there it is called capim Angola. its hairy leaves sticky, occurs natu- aided by cattle. Like Guinea grass it may have been rally in two disjunct areas of tropi- Despite its early establishment, introduced as bedding in slave cal Africa. The western one ex- molasses grass, also known in Latin ships. It was well established in tends in an arc from central Angola America as calinguero, seems to Brazil at least as early as 1823, for to Cameroun, while another to the have been curiously slow in moving it was first described taxonomically east includes the lower slopes and beyond Brazil. It is said to have in that year from a specimen col- adjacent areas of the Ruwenzori been introduced from there to lected at Rio de Janeiro. It was in Range and Mount Kenya (Rattray, Venezuela in 1860, but apparently Guadeloupe, French West Indies, 1960). The time and manner of its without major consequence. It was sometime prior to 1844, when it initial introduction into the New not known in Colombia until 1906 was taken to Venezuela with some World is unrecorded, but it is clear when seeds were inadvertently in- fanfare (Official correspondence. . . that molasses grass found here cluded in packets of seed of jaragud, 1849). From there it was carried to optimal ecologic conditions. The another African invader, that were the Santa Marta area of Colombia worn and eroded soils of the aban- being sent from Brazil by the Co- (Ospina Vasquez, 1955). Its adop- doned coffee lands of the Paraiba lombian Minister to that country, tion was rapid, especially in Antio- Valley, between Rio and SBo Paulo, General Rafael Uribe Uribe (Par- quia and the middle Magdalena are almost taken over by this self- sons, 1968, p. 133). The true jaragua AFRICAN GRASSES 15 took hold slowly and unimpres- years later, he found it to be “com- (“yaragua,” “faragua”) meaning sively in Antioquia, where the seeds pletely naturalized and reproducing roughly “master of the field.” In were first sown, and since two spontaneously, as well as being cul- Brazil, it is also known as capim grasses resulted from the packets tivated on a large scale as a forage vermelho, because the tips of the sent by General Uribe, the public crop of recognized excellence” (Pit- leaves redden conspicuously on ma- gave the name yaragua (jaragua) to tier, 1937). It is first mentioned in turing. that which prospered better, the Costa Rica in 1908; twenty years Remarkably, j aragua seems not unsuspected Melinis. As a result it later it was described as “completely to have spread beyond Brazil to any became known, quite erroneously, naturalized” there in some areas. other part of Latin America prior as yaragua or yaragua Uribe. The Hitchcock and Chase (1917) do not to General Uribe’s introduction of confusion in terminology resulting mention it in their “Grasses of the seeds into Colombia in 1906. He from this circumstance still persists, West Indies.” By 1920, however, it himself presumed it to be a native not only in Colombia but in neigh- was being distributed by a Cuban of Goias, observing that it was boring Venezuela and in Puerto experiment station, from whence it spreading rapidly there, often driv- Rico, to which the species appar- was introduced into Mexico (Ta- ing out molasses grass (Uribe Uribe, ently was carried from Colombia. basco) four years later (Martinez, 1955, p. 330-333). “If it doesn’t The spread of molasses grass out- 1959). In Mexico, however, it has deserve the title ‘Queen of the ward from the point of its initial never become very well established. grasses,’ ” the General wrote with introduction in Colombia was re- It was present in by reference to Brazil, “it is only be- markably rapid. Only three years 1923, but it was only after a second cause of the incomparable Guinea after it had first been planted in and well-publicized introduction grass.” Cheese made in Minas the Amalfi district of Antioquia a from Colombia three years later Gerais from dairy cows fattened on hacienda there had demands for that it began to take hold vigor- jaragua he pronounced the most more than 4,000 kilograms of seed ously (Chardon, 1930). A study of exquisite he had ever eaten and he coming from all parts of the repub- the Puerto Rico grasslands includes hoped that Colomibans might one lic and from Ecuador in response a Melinis minutiflora disclimax as day enjoy a comparable product. to some articles in a Bogota news- one of the principal associa- Once established in Colombia, he paper. It was heralded as “the sal- tions in the central highlands accurately predicted, it would be vation of Antioquia,” a province (Garcia-Molinari, 1952). In Jamai- only a matter of time before it with particularly steep slopes and ca’s Blue Mountains it has become would take over the country, at much thin, eroded soil. At first it widespread on “ruinate” lands least below the 1500-meter contour. was carefully seeded in beds of above 2500 feet elevation. There it Colombia seems to have served as ashes with the first maize crop in is known as Wynne grass and its the staging base from which the new forest clearings, but it quickly characteristic spicy fragrance is red-tipped jaragua, like molasses became a volunteer, invading aban- even mentioned as an attraction in grass, spread to the rest of tropical doned cafetales, road cuts, railway the tourist literature. Spanish America. It is in the dec- embankments and even pastures ade of the 1920’s that it is first dominated by native grasses. Con- Jaraguii reported in the Central Andes, in tinuing forest destruction, together Jaragua () is a Central America and in the West with man-set dry-season fires and member of one of the two most Indies. Especially in the drier areas, assiduous roguing of weedy woody common and widespread genera of where the dry season lasts five growth is encouraging its expan- grasses in tropical and sub-tropical months or more, it has held a strong sion. A recent study of the Colom- Africa. It is dispersed by seed with competitive advantage. Outside of bian Llanos (Blydenstein, 1967) uncommon ease and it seems rea- Brazil, it has perhaps reached its identifies a “Melinis minutiflora sonable to assume repeated acci- maximum development in the drier association” on the higher terraces dental introductions on slave ships. western side of Central America, and foothills at the eastern base of It was certainly in Brazil early, and especially in Guanacaste and in the Andes. like the other grasses previously Nicaragua where it is recognized In one generation molasses grass mentioned has frequently been as the base of a substantial live- has largely taken over the temperate considered to be part of the native s tack industry. It was surprisingly uplands of tropical America. Dur- flora. It was first identified tax- slow in reaching Mexico. It is first ing the ‘twenties’ it spread south- onomically in 1829 (originally recorded for the Vera Cruz coast ward into Peru and Bolivia and Trachypogon rufus Nees) on the in 1924 and the following year was northward through Central Amer- basis of a specimen collected by introduced into Tabasco where to- ica and Mexico. Henri Pittier had Martius in Piaui in the northeast day it supports an important live- observed it in Venezuela in 1913, of Brazil (Chase and Niles, 1962). stock industry around Palenque. but restricted only to the immediate Throughout Latin America, it is Jaragua is also prominent in Cuba vicinity of Caracas. Twenty-three known by the Tupi name jaragua where it was first sown on marginal 16 PARSONS lands in Oriente province as early shows very vigorous vegetative de- killed off, Kikuyu came back early as 1920. Six years later it was re- velopment of runners and stolons and strong, apparently invigorated ported by Hitchcock as “becoming but its reproductive organs tend to by the ash. Dairymen who once naturalized” near Camaguey. By be reduced and stunted. This con- scorned it now describe Kikuyu as 1950, it was found throughout the centration on vegetative matter their strongest, most resistant and island, “no pasture grass having probably enhances its value as pas- resilient pasture, supporting one ever spread so rapidly” (Alonso ture. In Ecuador and Colombia it head per acre throughout the year. Olive, 1953). In Puerto Rico, in prospers best above 6,000 feet com- contrast, it seems to have estab- ing down progressively lower as it Pangola Grass lished itself much more slowly. In moves away from the equator. In The most recent African invader Venezuela, too its establishment Mexico City, where it was intro- is Pangola grass (Digitaria de- must have initially have been slow. duced as a lawn grass perhaps as cumbens), apparently a very un- As late as 1936 Pittier could write late as 1950, it has invaded vacant important species in its home on that he had not yet encountered it lots as a weed and is a common the Pangola River in South Africa. there, although he suspected that it grass in Chapultepec Park. But It was introduced into a had been introduced (Pittier, 1937). there it needs watering for good experiment station in 1935 and Thirty years later it was one of the growth. In La Paz it crowds out from there was taken to the West most widespread and conspicuous other lawn grass and grows aggres- Indies and the mainland of Central exotic grasses in that country. sively in cracks in the pavement. and . Like Kikuyu, Jaragua’s remarkable aggressive- It is a weed along the temperate it is propagated exclusively by sto- ness and its self-seeding ability is coast of California, at least as far lons or stem cutting, being a sterile demonstrated by its capacity to north as San Francisco Bay Area, triploid that does not produce seed. compete with native savanna where it is employed sparingly as a Currently it enjoys great popularity grasses. Clumps of jaragua, well lawn grass. Originally from the in tropical America, although in established and vigorously spread- slopes of Kilamanjaro and the some areas it is subject to a destruc- ing, can be seen at the Llanos Ex- Kenya-Uganda lake country, this tive virus disease. When healthy, perimental Station at Calabozo, mat-forming, stoloniferous species its low, thick sward tends to crowd Venezuela, far removed from any seems to have first reached the out all competition. possible seed source and in the Americas in the early 1920’s, prob- Pangola grass was introduced midst of a coarse Trachypogon ably through agricultural experi- into Puerto Rico in 1946 and the savanna scattered with gnarled, fire- ment station activity. The first same year into Costa Rica. For resistant Curatella and Byrsonima references that I have found to it most other countries the date of its trees. Within a generation, parts are from 1923, and at three widely introduction is some time in the of the open Venezuelan Llanos may separated places- Brazil, Guate- ‘fifties. It has a wide range of adapt- well be dominated by this aggres- mala, and Peru. Characteristically, ability and has been found doing sive African invader. Even more is has escaped from trial plots to well to elevations as high as 5,000 than the other exotic grasses in the overrun adjacent areas. At first feet in Costa Rica and even higher New World tropics jaragua appears considered an ineradicable weed, it in Colombia. In Jamaica it has to be aided by fire. After a number is today recognized as a valuable been used extensively for rehabili- of years, it may tend to weaken and pasture grass in lower latitudes. In tation of mined out bauxite areas. eventually be invaded by other spe- a period of about 40 years since its Its susceptibility to disease is cur- cies unless regularly burned. Stock- introduction onto the Sabana de rently resulting in its displacement men, who know this well, fire Bogota it has almost completely on newly cleared lands in Mato jaragua ranges each year in the dry overrun every open field and road- Grosso, where it has enjoyed re- season and graze it rather closely side, choking out all competition. cent popularity, by an even newer during the rainy period to avoid its Similarly it has invaded the Quito African introduction, signal grass becoming rank and fibrous, with basin and the upper yungas of Peru or Brachiara brixantha, also con- progressively lower nutritive value. and Bolivia. It mantels the terraces sidered to have great promise. of the famous ruins of Machu Pic- There are other grasses, includ- Kikuyu Grass chu in Peru. On the slopes of Costa ing several from the more temper- In contrast to other African im- Rica’s Irazti volcano, where it was ate parts of the African continent, migrants previously discussed, Ki- introduced about 1928, it was long that are contributing to the “Afri- kuyu grass (Pennisetum clandesti- considered a pest which tended to canization” of the tropical Ameri- num) belongs chiefly to the tierras dominate the so-called noble grasses can grasslands. Among these are frias. In the last twenty years, it such as orchard, rye and fescue in the ubiquitous Bermuda grass has spread explosively throughout the zone from 6,000 to 9,000 feet. (Cynodon dactylon L.), Johnson the higher elevations wherever there Following the 1964-65 eruptions of grass ( halepensis L.), is no severe drought period. It Irazti, when all other grasses were Rhodes grass (Chloris gayana AFRICAN GRASSES 17

Kunth), elephant grass (Pennise- livestock industry in the low lati- Congr., Palmerston North. Welling- turn purpureum Schumach) and tudes of the New World tropics. ton, N. Z., 611 p. (p. 190-200) Natal grass (Tricholaena rosea HITCHCOCK,A. S., ANDA. CHASE. 191’7. Grasses of the West Indies. Contrib. Nees). Although some of these are Literature Cited U. S. National Herb. Vol. 18, pt. 7, aggressive colonizers, none has as- ALONSO OLIVE, R. F. 1953. Pastos y p. 261-471. Government Printing sumed the importance within the forrajes, una vista panorAmica de su Office, Washington. American tropics of the species re- historia en Cuba. Revista de Agricul- MARTINEZ, M. 1959. Plantas utiles de viewed. tura, Habana. 36:89-108. la flora mexicana. Ediciones Botas, This African invasion is reminis- ANON. 1922. Efwatakala grass-Melinis Mexico, 621 p. cent of the replacement of the Cal- minutiflora, Beauv. Kew Bull. 10: OFFICIAL CORRESPONDENCERELATING TO ifornia bunch grass by Mediterra- 305-3 16. PARA GRASS. 1949. Royal Hortic. BLYDENSTEIN, J. 1967. Tropical sa- nean annuals, but in the tropical sot., 4:44-49. vanna vegetation of the llanos de example human agency plays a OSPINA VASQUEZ,L. 1955. Industria y Colombia. Ecology 48: 1-15. larger role. The movement has protection en Columbia, 1810-1930. BOR, N. L. 1960. The grasses of Editorial Santafe, Medellin, 531 p. been almost all one way, from Burma, Ceylon, India and Pakistan, PARSONS,J. J. 1968. Antioqueno col- Africa to the Americas, as is also Pergamon excluding Bambuseae. onization in western Colombia. Re- the case with the Mediterranean Press, Oxford, London, New York, vised. Univ. of Calif. Press, Berkeley Paris, 767 p. grasses. The 4frican grasses stand and Los Angeles, 233 p. BURKILL, I. H. 1935. Dictionary of the up better to grazing and have PITTIER, H. 1937. Lista provisional de economic plants of the Malay Penin- higher nutritives values than na- las Gramineas sefialadas en Vene- sula. Crown Agents for colonies, tive American species. In this zuela hasta 1936. Min. Agr. y Cria, London, 2 ~01s. respect the invasions can be con- Boletin Tecnica 1, Caracas, 77 p. CHARD~N, C. 1930. Reconocimiento PITTIER, H. 1957. Ensayo sobre plantas sidered advantageous, although bot- agro-pecuario de1 Valle de1 Cauca. usuales de Costa Rica. 2d. ed. Edi- anists may mourn the disappear- Mision agricola al Valle de1 Cauca, torial Universitaria, San Jose, Costa ance of native members of the flora San Juan, Puerto Rico, 342 p. Rica, 264 p. that it may cause. A somewhat sim- CHASE, A. 1944. Grasses of Brazil and RATTRAY, J. M. 1960. The grass cover ilar, but less spectacular, spread of Venezuela. Agr. in the Amer. 4: of Africa. FAO Agricultural Study African grasses into the Southeast 123-126. No. 49, Rome, 168 p. with accom- CHASE, A., ANDC. NILES. (camps.), 1962. Asian tropics may also be docu- panying map. mented (e.g. Burkhill, 1935; Bor, Index to grass species. G. K. Hall, Boston, 3 ~01s. RESTREPO, J. M. 1952-1963. Historia 1960; Whyte, 1968) but the second- COOPER, J. P. 1965. The evolution of de la Nueva Granada. Editorial Cro- ary role of stock-raising there, to- forage grasses and legumes. In: Sir mos, Bogota, 2 ~01s. gether with the existence of Joseph Hutchinson, ed., Essays in RIVAS, M. 1946. Los trabajadores de aggressive, indigenous species such crop plant evolution. Cambridge tierra caliente. Ministerio de Educa- as Imperata cylindrica and Saccha- Univ. Press, Cambridge, 204 p. (p. cion, Bogota, 364 p. rum spontaneum, makes this inva- 142-165) SLOANE, H. 1707-1725. A voyage to . . . . . sion of a lesser order of consequence. EDWARDS,B. 1801. The history, civil Madera Printed by B. M. (British Museum) for the author, Good grazing grasses appear to and commercial, of the British col- London, 2 ~01s. develop under grazing pressure. onies in the West Indies. J. Stock- dale, London, 3 ~01s. STERNBERG,H. O’R. 1968. Man and Few cultivated grasses are indige- ESPONDA,J. M. 1888. Manuel practica environmental change in South nous to the New World. We have to de1 nuevo ganadero mexicana. Se- America. In: E. J. Fittkau et al. go to the Great Plains, with its buf- cretaria de Fomento, Mexico, 132 p. (eds.), Biogeography and ecology of falo and grama grasses, to find any- GARCIA-MOLINARI,0. 1952. Grasslands South America. Dr. W. Junk, The thing remotely equivalent to the and grasses of Puerto Rico. Univ. Hague, 2 ~01s. (1:415445) Old World grasses in terms of graz- Puerto Rico, Agr. Exp. Sta. Bull. TORRES, A. DI P. 1954. Agressividade ing value. From the American trop- 102, Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico, 167 p. de algumas gramineas forrageiras na regiPo de Piracicaba. Anais de Es- ics come Bahia grass (Paspalum GARDNER,G. 1846. Travels in the inte- rior of Brazil. Reeve, London, 562 p. cola Superior de Agricultura (Luis notatum Fluegge), Carpet grass (Ax- HARRIS, D. R. 1965. Plants, animals de Queiroz) Brazil. 11:93-l 14. onopus compressus Beauv.), and Im- and man in outer Leeward Islands. URIBE URIBE, R. 1955. Por la America perial (Axonopus scoparius L.). But Univ. Calif. Publ. Geogr., 18, Univ. de1 Sur. Editorial Kelly, Bogota, 2 none of these are of major impor- of Calif. Press, Berkeley and Los An- vols. tance. It is instead the largely un- geles, 184 p. WEINTRAUB, F. 1953. Grasses intro- duced into the United States. U. S. noticed but massive invasions of the HARTLEY, W., AND R. J. WILLIAMS. 1956. Centres of distribution of cul- Dep. Agr. Handbook 58. 79 p. vigorous African species that is at tivated pasture grasses and their sig- WHYTE, R. 0. 1968. Grasslands of the the base of the new hope for the de- nificance for plant introduction. In: monsoon. Frederick A. Praeger, New velopment of a viable commercial Proceedings, 7th Int. Grassland York, Washington, 325 .p.