Flora of North America species comparison

polystichous, mostly spreading-excurved, to 1/2 as long as culms;

sheaths usually entire;

ligule absent;

blades linear, 2–3 mm wide, flat or shallowly involute, margin scabrid, apex blunt.

distichous, in fans, to ca. 2/3 plant height;

sheaths keeled, equitant, margins entire;

ligule absent;

blades bifacial (flattened in same plane as sheath), narrowly triangularlinear, to 2 mm wide, margins scabrid at least distally.

simple or compound anthelae with numerous small pedunculate clusters of sessile spikelets;

scapes linear, distally terete, 1–2 mm thick;

involucral bracts short, usually shorter than inflorescence.

anthela compound, usually diffuse, branched, broadening upward, often as broad as long;

scapes slender, angularly ribbed and/or somewhat compressed distally, 1–1.5 mm wide or thick;

involucral bracts exceeded by anthela.

greenish brown or yellow-brown, ovoid, 2–3 mm;

fertile scales broadly ovate, 1–1.5 mm, obtuse or apically notched, midrib not excurrent.

dark red-brown, broadly ovoid to near round, 2–4 min;

fertile scales broadly ovate to orbiculate, 1 mm, glabrous, apex broadly rounded, midrib not excurrent.

stamens usually 1;

styles 2-fid, slender, glabrous.

stamens 1–2;

styles 3-fid, slender, base dilated, apex pubescent.

dark brown to nearly black, tumidly obovoid, rarely obscurely 3-ribbed, 1 mm, faintly striate to variously warty, faintly reticulate.

pale brown, tumid, obovoid, 1 mm, apiculate, reticulate, with pits narrowly rectangular in 4–6 vertical rows per side, the longitudinal ribs most prominent and mostly warty.

= 56.

= 10.