Subject: Sedges Poem?

From: John Blackmer <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 04 Jun 1996 14:29:56 -0700

There is a poem of some sort that contains the line "sedges have edges"

Does anyone know of it? If so, I'd like the details.

Post or e-mail. Thanks

John

---

From: [email-masked] (Monique Reed)
Date: Tue, 4 Jun 1996 16:38:16 UNDEFINED

>Does anyone know of it? If so, I'd like the details.

I don't know about a poem, but it's a jingle that we teach our field botany 
students to tell the sedges from the grasses and rushes.  It works fine, until 
you run into Eleocharis ;- )

Monique Reed
Texas A&M University

---

From: "Samuel M. Scheiner" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 05 Jun 1996 08:21:34 -0700

> Does anyone know of it? If so, I'd like the details.

Here is what I learned. Does anyone know of a less risque version that 
can be used in these more sensitive times?

"Sedges have edges, rushes are round, and grasses like asses have holes."
-- 
**********************************************************               
     
Samuel M. Scheiner                                               
Dept. of Life Sciences (2352)   P.O. Box 37100                    
Arizona State University West   Phoenix, AZ 85069        
Tel: 602-543-6934               Fax: 602-543-6073                        
    
E-mail: [email-masked]  
http://lsvl.la.asu.edu/botany/faculty/scheiner.html                    
**********************************************************

---

From: [email-masked] (Monique Reed)
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 13:59:02 UNDEFINED

>"Sedges have edges, rushes are round, and grasses like asses have holes."

Eek!  I could get fired for saying that!  Not to mention that several genera 
of warm-season grasses have *solid* rather than hollow internodes.  Nope, 
can't use as is!

We're a clever bunch!  Surely if we can't find the original, we can *invent*
some little rhyme to cover field ID of grassy things...

Consider it a challenge...
Monique

---

From: Tom Schweich <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 05 Jun 1996 13:11:38 -0700

> Does anyone know of it? If so, I'd like the details.

"Sedges have edges and rushes are round,
Grasses are hollow and rush all around."

I learned it from the late George Hilton, who was a geologist,
and a teacher of field natural history classes at Merritt College
in Oakland, CA.

-- 
Tom Schweich, [email-masked]
http://www.well.com/user/schweich/

---

From: [email-masked] (Brad Hurley)
Date: Thu, 06 Jun 1996 07:32:33 -0400

This thread reminds me of another jingle, this one about gymnosperms:

"For you I pine, for you I balsam
But when I cedar, I spruced up."

Learned  years ago from G. Winston Carter, botanist and instructor for the
National Audubon Society's camp in Greenwich, Connecticut.

-- 
Brad Hurley
Freelance Environmental and Science Writing
31 Gage Street
Bellows Falls, VT 05101-1616, USA
Tel: +1 802 463 9417; Fax: +1 802 463 4217; e-mail: [email-masked]

"I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars...
And a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels."

--Walt Whitman

---

From: [email-masked] (Arthur Evans)
Date: Thu, 06 Jun 1996 23:26:57 -0700

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked]

> some little rhyme to cover field ID of grassy things...

Hm. Let's see. How about:

Sedges have edges,/rushes are round,
And grasses are hollow/except for the several genera that have solid internodes.

I'll admit that the scansion could use a little work--but more
accurate, hmm? OK, how about:

Sedges have edges,/rushes are round,
And grasses are usually/hollow, I've found.

Of course, it seems to me that many grasses are round,
and many rushes are hollow, so I don't see how this helps.
I think you need a more Zen approach. Meditate on the plant.
Does it posess rush nature? Or grass nature?

> Consider it a challenge...

I feel challenged, all right.

yours,
arthur

---

From: "[email-masked]" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 07 Jun 1996 20:19:53 -0700

Remember: grasses have nodes!

"...grasses AREN'T hollow from tip to the ground!"

---

From: [email-masked] (Nancy Harrison)
Date: 10 Jun 1996 22:27:00 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] says...
>you run into Eleocharis ;- )

Rushes are round
And Sedges have edges

..Until you run into Scirpus, which is in the Sedge Family
but can be round. -NH

---

From: John Blackmer <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 11 Jun 1996 14:44:13 -0700

As the poster of the original question, I'd like to thank everyone for their repsonses 
to this point. I have passed them along to the person who asked me start with. 

Yes, all of them.

I'll keep watching for a while to see if anyone comes up with anything 
different.

Thanks,

John

-- 

-----------------------------------------------
John Blackmer
River Bend Nature Center
Faribault MN USA
[email-masked]
-----------------------------------------------

---

From: ToddCrabtree <[email-masked]>
Date: 11 Jun 1996 21:59:03 GMT

"Sedges have edges, rushes are round, and on grasses nodes may be found."

---

From: [email-masked] (H. Brent Howatt)
Date: 12 Jun 1996 15:33:56 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] says...
>accurate, hmm? OK, how about:

#Sedges have edges,/rushes are round,
#And grasses are usually/hollow, I've found.

The way I learned it in the '60's was:
Rushes are round;
Sedges have edges;
Grasses have joints.

#Of course, it seems to me that many grasses are round,
#and many rushes are hollow, so I don't see how this helps.
#I think you need a more Zen approach. Meditate on the plant.
#Does it posess rush nature? Or grass nature?

Chant, "palea...lemma...glume"
Repeat until enightened.

-- 
H. Brent Howatt                 |The deluded are always filled with absolutes
[email-masked] |The rest of us have to live with ambiguities
Finger or e-mail for PGP key    |              _Aristoi_  Walter Jon Williams
=============================================================================