Isolepis cernua |
|
---|---|
fiberoptic grass, low bulrush, low clubrush, low lateral clubrush, tuft clubrush |
|
Habit | Plants annual (or perennial?); rhizomes usually obscured by culm bases and very short, sometimes vertical and elongated. |
Culms | 4–40 cm × 0.2–0.5 mm. |
Leaves | sometimes sparsely orange-punctate at 10–15X; sheaths usually reddish proximally; distal blade rudimentary to much longer than sheath, often exceeding culm, to 20 cm × 0.2–1 mm. |
Inflorescences | involucral bract 1, sometimes subtending flower or resembling enlarged floral scale, 2–6(–23) mm. |
Spikelets | 2–5 × 1–2 mm; scales partly or completely dark orange to red-brown, rarely stramineous, midrib greenish to stramineous, not gibbous, obscurely to prominently 3–11-veined, midrib keeled near apex, membranous, hyaline, apex rounded to acute, with mucro less than 0.1 mm; proximal scale to 2 mm; other scales 1.2–1.8 × 1–1.3 mm. |
Flowers | anthers 0.3–0.6 mm; styles 3-fid or 3-fid and 2-fid. |
Achenes | falling separately from scales, medium to dark brown or stramineous, ellipsoid to obovoid, compressed-trigonous to thickly biconvex, lateral angles usually prominent, abaxial angle prominent to obscure, faces convex or adaxial face slightly concave, 0.8–1 × 0.5–0.7 mm, distinctly papillose at 10–15X to obscurely papillose at 40X, often with thin whitish surface layer. |
2n | = 30. |
Isolepis cernua |
|
Phenology | Fruiting late spring–winter (Pacific Coast), winter–spring (Texas). |
Habitat | Wet, freshwater to brackish places on beaches, dunes, marine bluffs, sandy areas, mostly coastal |
Elevation | 0–800 m (0–2600 ft) |
Distribution |
CA; OR; TX; WA; BC; Mexico (Baja California); temperate South America; Eurasia; Africa; Australia; New Zealand
|
Discussion | Isolepis cernua is widespread and variable. Four varieties were recognized by A. M. Muasya and D. M. Simpson (2002). Only var. ceruna is known from North America. The earliest collection I have seen from the Pacific Coast is from 1888; the earliest collection I have seen from Texas is from 1974. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 23, p. 139. |
Parent taxa | Cyperaceae > Isolepis |
Sibling taxa | |
Synonyms | Scirpus cernuus, Scirpus cernuus var. californicus, Scirpus cernuus subsp. californicus |
Name authority | (Vahl) Roemer & Schultes: in J. J. Roemer et al., Syst. Veg. 2: 106. (1817) |
Web links |
|