For discussion of the origins and development of the grass database, and detailed acknowledgements, see Watson, Dallwitz and Johnston (1986), Watson (1988) and Watson and Dallwitz (1994). We are especially indebted to S.G. Aiken, H.T. Clifford, R.P. Ellis, G.E. Gibbs Russell, E.A. Kellogg, H.P. Linder, T.D. Macfarlane, H.D.V. Prendergast, A. Van den Borre, B.K. Simon, R.D. Webster and C.M. Weiller for contributing in various ways, including provision of unpublished descriptive data; to Chris Frylink and Jill Hartley, for excellent technical work including most of the photography; to Paul Hattersley, for access to his comprehensive collection of offprints relating to variation in photosynthetic pathways, for advice in interpreting that material, and for permission to use his fluorescence-microscopic photos of leaf sections; to the Botanical Research Institute, Pretoria, and the Western Australian Herbarium, for permission to use illustrations from Gibbs Russell et al. (1990) and Gardner (1952), respectively; and to Julia Rymer and Jill Hartley, for expertly scanning the illustrations.
We acknowledge in particular the contribution of Terry Macfarlane, for continued constructive comments on generic descriptions and (especially since L.W.’s retirement in 1994) for seeking out, organizing and forwarding photocopies of numerous relevant references, via the library facilities of the Western Australian Herbarium. Without his efforts, the co-operaton and financial assistance of that Institution, and Jef Velkamp’s invaluable lists of references (Grass Literature, 1–19), it would have been impossible to maintain any pretence of keeping the descriptions up to date.