[f. WIRE sb. + GRASS sb.] A name for various grasses or grass-like plants having wiry stems.

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  1.  U.S. The British flat-stemmed meadow-grass Poa compressa, or the annual grass Eleusine indica, naturalized in North America.

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1793.  M. Cutler, in Life, etc. (1888), II. 294. Wire-grass, which is Poa compressa.

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1856.  Olmsted, Slave States, 341. The wire-grass, which grew among the trees the previous year, is frequently set on fire … in the spring.

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1856.  Gray, Man. Bot. (1860), 554. Eleusine Indica. Dog’s-tail or Wire Grass.

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1883.  Phil Robinson, in Harper’s Mag., Oct., 710/2. The wire-grass had been roughly plaited into a little mat.

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  2.  One of several other plants, as the West Indian Paspalum filiforme, the Australian Tetrarrhena (or Ehrharta) juncea, the North American Sporobolus junceus and species of Aristida.

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1824.  Burchell, Trav., II. 5. The Wire-grass of the island of St. Helena.

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1864.  Grisebach, Flora W. Ind. Isl., 789. Wire-grass, Paspalum filiforme.

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1883.  E. M. Curr, Recoll. Squatting Victoria, viii. 81. The wire-grass, however, largely predominating over the kangaroo grass.

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