Flora of North America species comparison

to 60 cm × 1.5 mm, scabrous.

35–75 cm.

sheaths usually all with blades;

proximal 2–3 sheaths to 10–15 cm with reduced blades shorter than sheath, green, fronts herbaceous, prominently veined, not splitting, apex truncate, fronts of distal sheaths hyaline, rugose, indistinctly linearly veined, apex colorless, hyaline, convex, entire;

ligules obtuse, 1.5 mm, free limb to 0.1 mm;

blades not clustered at base, not epistomic, to 40 cm × 5 mm.

sheath summits U-shaped, sometimes prolonged to 2 mm beyond collar;

distal ligules 2.5–8 mm;

blades 3–5 per fertile culm; 15–45 cm × 2–3(–4) mm.

very condensed, ovoid or shortly cylindric, with 5–10 indistinguishable branches, to 2.5 × 1.5 cm;

proximal internode not visible, not more than 3 mm;

proximal bract scalelike, inconspicuous.

ascending, dense, green to gold or brown, (1–)1.4–2.5 cm × 9–17 mm;

proximal internode 1.5–4 mm; 2d internode 1–4 mm;

proximal 2–3 bracts erect to ascending, leaflike, the proximal longer than inflorescence, often more than 2 mm wide, base ± surrounding culm.

5–11, ± individually indistinct, ovoid to broadly ovoid, 7–13 × 5–9 mm, base rounded to acute, apex truncate to acute.

pale brown, 9–11-veined abaxially, 5–7-veined adaxially, to 3.5 × 1.5 mm, base distended only slightly proximally, cordate;

stipe to 0.2 mm;

beak to 2 mm, margins serrulate, apex bidentate, teeth to 0.1 mm.

ascending to ascending-spreading, green, gold, or sometimes coppery, conspicuously 0–11-veined abaxially, conspicuously 0–8-veined adaxially, ovate to lanceolate, usually flat, 3.5–5 × 1.3–1.75 mm, 0.3–0.5 mm thick, margin flat, including wing 0.2–0.3 mm wide;

beak usually gold or red-brown at tip, usually flat, winged, ± ciliate-serrulate or, sometimes, cylindric, unwinged, ± entire for 0.5–0.6 mm, (1.4–)1.7–2.5 mm, abaxial suture inconspicuous or with white margin, distance from beak tip to achene.

obovate, to 1.5 × 1 mm;

stalk to 0.2 mm;

persistent style base cylindric.

stipitate, ovate to obovate, (1.2–)1.5–1.9 × 0.75–1(–1.2) mm, 0.3–0.4 mm thick.

hyaline, brown, distinctly shorter than perigynia.

scales pale gold to red-brown, with pale to green midstripe, lanceolate to ovate, 3.3–4.8 mm, shorter and narrower than perigynia, margin sometimes white, 0.1–0.2 mm wide, apex acuminate to awned.