Family of cereals, or Bluegrass, can be safely attributed to the most numerous of the known families. It includes many crops that are in demand in agricultural production, without which many simply cannot imagine life: these are wheat, rice, corn, sugarcane, bamboo and many other widespread plants.
Cereals are widespread on all continents without exception – and even in Antarctica not so long ago, cereals (bluegrass) were discovered. Well, in savannas and steppe zones, it is cereals that are the overwhelming basis of all phytomass. In total, this family includes about six thousand species.
Description of cereals
The entire family of cereals can be attributed to the vast class of monocots. And among this family there are herbaceous, and shrubs, and trees: both annuals and perennials.
Among the huge number of all cereals, neither epiphytes nor saprophytes can be found. There are no parasites among them. The variety of cereals can be divided according to their structure into:
- turf-like;
- stolon-forming;
- long-rhizome.
These groups, in turn, are divided into subgroups, which differ from each other in the most different details of the structure of the shoots (both its above-ground and underground parts).
For example, an extensive group of cereals – sod-like – is usually divided, depending on the process of renewal of shoots (and it can be extravaginal and intravaginal), into loose sod and dense sod subgroups.
Usually, the shoots of these plants are both generative and vegetative, with alternate plates of narrow leaves arranged in two rows and equipped with parallel veins.
Types of cereal plants
Cereal plants
Cereal plants usually include the most common plants for almost everyone:
- Wheat is a herbaceous plant that can be called the leading grain crop in most parts of the planet;
- Rye, whether sown or cultivated, is a herbaceous plant that unites more than four dozen varieties;
- Corn, the only representative of its genus, which includes four wild-growing types of corn, sweet corn and three of their subspecies;
- Rice is a cereal crop of the cereal family, quite demanding on growing conditions, but extremely common in Asian countries.
Wheat
Rye
Corn
Rice
Oat
Barley
Millet
Ornamental cereal plants
Among the decorative cereals are:
- Bamboo, a genus rich in 130 plant species found in the tropics of Asia, Africa, America and Australia;
- Reeds are herbaceous plants found in swampy areas on almost all continents.
Amaranth is a widespread culture called velvet, fox tail, axamitnik.
Bamboo
Cane
Miscanthus
Amaranth
Feather grass
Canary grass
Weeds
Weed cereals usually include:
- wheatgrass;
- millet;
- rubber;
- multicolored chaff;
- bluegrass
Creeping wheatgrass
Chicken millet
Rye bonfire
Rubber
Annual bluegrass
Herbs
In addition to the familiar and familiar to all cultivated plants, the family of cereals also has weeds that are harmful to agriculture, and perennial grasses are absolutely harmless. Herbal plants of the cereal family include:
- pearl barley;
- feather grass;
- grate.
Shaking
Pearl barley
Feather grass
Kolosnyak
Molinia
Signs and features of cereals
Cereals are distinguished by a variety of life forms – here and shrubs with semi-shrubs, and trees, and grasses (both perennial and annual). In general, all cereals have common biological characteristics both in the root system and in other aspects.
For example, most of them are characterized by a fibrous root system, which has both primary and secondary roots. Cereal inflorescences are panicles or ears, brushes or ears. The fruits of cereals are pseudomonocarpies, or, more simply, caryopses, a feature of which is a membranous pericarp adjacent to the seed, sometimes even growing together with spermoderma.
Cultivation of cereals also requires caution: here you need to observe the sowing time and the order of crop rotation. It should be borne in mind that winter cereals reach ripeness by the end of summer, trying to keep within the onset of frost. And in order to start growing, these types of cereals require just a low temperature – starting from 0C degrees. And spring varieties, on the contrary, develop at rather high temperatures – from 10 to 20 degrees, and they need to be sown in a warm spring. At the same time, winter varieties are more productive – after all, they are better able to use all the resource potential of the earth: both nutrients and moisture reserves.
The sowing time for winter crops is after early harvested crops (legumes, for example), but spring crops are sown immediately after row crops and grasses.
Fertilizer for cereals is usually applied in the fall in the form of winter treatments – for example, when sowing, fertilizer granules (nitrogen and phosphorus) are added to the crop rows. The same feeding is carried out in the spring.
The structure of cereals
Inflorescences of cereals consist of a large number of elementary spikelet inflorescences, and usually there are several types of them:
- Spikelets;
- Racemose;
- Paniculate;
- The beginnings.
Flowers in cereals are usually small and pale in color: they usually include three stamens, a fruit breeder with a shortened column and a pair of feathery stigmas. The fruit of almost all cereals is a caryopsis, i.e. seed densely grown together with a thin shell.
In turn, the shoots of most of the cereal crops can be divided into vegetative and generative – and each of these shoots can easily relate to both a perennial plant and an annual.
Usually, in cereals there is no mechanism of secondary thickening in the stem zone, and the branching system is organized in the tillering zone, or is directly connected with the inflorescence area.
Stems of cereals can be classified as cylindrical. All of them are generally segmented, and in internodes they are usually hollow, like straws. There is an exception to this rule – several species and families (for example, bamboo, corn and reed).
Inflorescences of cereals usually consist of several elementary parts, spikelets, in which, as a rule, there are several flowers – wind and self-pollinated. In typical cases, such flowers have several floral scales – upper and lower. In this case, the median vein of the scale forms a sharp rib, which has received the characteristic name “keel”. The upper chushuya forms several such keels, which, most likely, are formed precisely from the accretion of several scales. Inside the main scales of the flower there are three small polyculi – they are considered to be elements belonging to the inner circle of the perianth.
Such a structure gives every reason to classify the perianth of cereals as three-membered, or three-dimensional. Usually there are three stamens in each flower, and several feathery stigmas are formed at the ovary.
The value of cereals
The importance of all cereals is difficult to underestimate, because most of them constitute the main food ration of mankind throughout the Earth. Bread, cereals and other cereal dishes have been made for several thousand years.
Although not all cereals were appreciated from the very beginning, bluegrass was not always given due attention. Exactly until the moment when humanity invented a way to grind the fruits of these plants into flour. And they began to make dough from flour, which became flat cakes and other types of bread.
However, cereals are not only the staple of the diet. They also have medical significance, because they contain a huge amount of useful substances.
Family of cereals – biology video tutorial
Conclusion
The family of cereals is diverse and very numerous – they number more than 750 genera. Usually, plants of this species are usually classified as monocots. A huge number of cereals have irreplaceable advantages – not only in the food sector, but also, for example, as decorative crops that are actively used in landscape design.
Cereals live on all continents as herbs and trees, and their fruits contain a huge amount of nutrients, essential oils, proteins, and the like. In addition, it is cereals that are an important element of fodder and food crops.
